Don't Dream It
by AllISeeAreStars
Summary: No one knew that Spencer had a sister, then she joins the team. Immediately she and Morgan become best friends. Elisabeth and Spencer have always been close, but how will they handle having to watch over each other and afraid that something will happen to one of them? How will Spencer react to his friend being interested in his baby sister? And Morgan and Elisabeth?
1. Brother

Chapter one: Brother

 _"_ _A sibling may be the keeper of one's identity, the only person with the keys to one's unfettered, more fundamental self." -Marian Sandmaier_

The house smelled like coffee, but not because she was making any. Truth is she hated coffee, but she _loved_ the smell. She had wax warmers all over the house, most with some coffee scent or another. Her preferred morning beverage was a smoothie, usually strawberry, always fruit. The fresh morning wind blew through her open window and the curtains. She moved to close it, wrapping her bright red scarf around her neck and pulling her black, double breasted coat tighter around her with a confident smile at herself.

"Jack, baby, come wish me luck."

She heard the even skittering of feet as her jack russell terrier came into the room and jumped to her bed. She looked over and chuckled, running a finger and scratching under his chin.

"I know you miss Charlie. Don't worry. I'll make sure he comes over soon."

She took a last glance at herself, the red scarf, white, tucked in ruffled blouse, black pencil skirt, coat, pantyhose, and black pumps. No make up aside from a pearl Softlips chapstick that made her lips tingle. A bit cliché, but nice and presentable.

"Well," she said. "Here we go."

Elisabeth drove, tapping her fingers on the wheel and humming an old song- an old Frank Sinatra song she and her brother used to dance to. Today was to be her first day working with her big brother, barely bigger. Only by five minutes. But he never let her forget it, taking care of her as his responsibility.

She saw him as soon as she stepped off the elevator at his desk in what he always called the bullpen. He was standing and not quite pacing, but she could tell he was waiting for her.

"Charlie?"

He looked to her and smiled, rushing to the stairs to lift her away from them and set her on her feet. "Beetle. Missed you."

"You saw me a month ago and now you'll see me everyday. You'll tire of me soon enough."

He hugged her tightly and pulled her towards a desk right next to his. "How was the drive?"

"Fun! I have pictures."

"I still wish you would have let me get you a flight."

She smiled and stole his chair. "Ugh, Charlie, I've watched Final Destination too many times. Besides, it was fun. Jack misses you."

Her twin grimaced. "Yeah, I'm sure he does. That's why he growls at me every time I enter the house. Speaking of, do you like the house?"

"Oh gosh, yes! You are a life saver. It fits all my parameters."

"How do you like the house warming gifts?"

She smiled. She'd missed him. They'd always been close. They read together when their mother's illness became too much for her to. Spencer took his responsibility as a big brother very seriously. Their biggest fight had been her wanting to join the BAU with him because he was afraid of her being hurt.

"Well, the CD I loved, but the coffee maker? Really?"

"It's for when I come over."

"That better be a lot. I missed you."

He smiled awkwardly. "Well, now you'll see me everyday. Your desk is right there." Across from his.

Elisabeth smirked with a gleam he was familiar with and she rolled in his chair over to her desk and passed him the chair meant to be hers. "Here."

"You're going to steal my chair? You realize they're exactly the same."

"No they're not," she contradicted. "This one was yours, which will make it more satisfying for me to sit in."

They stared at each other for a moment and he grabbed the back of her chair, trying to pull it away from under her. "Alright, give it back."

"No! It's mine. You can't have it."

"Tess, you have your own."

"But-"

"Whoa, whoa." She looked up in a moment of pause that they were at work and it was her first day and this was probably not appropriate. This distraction caused her to be thrown out of the stolen chair and onto her knees in front of possibly one of the most good looking men she'd ever seen. Immediately Spencer was at her side and trying to help her up, but her eyes never left those of the tall, muscular man that couldn't be anyone but Derek Morgan.

"Are you okay, Beetle?"

"I-I'm okay." She glanced out of the corner of her eye and saw Spencer still staring concernedly. "Really, Charlie. I'm fine, bu-ut you know what would make me better?"

"You are not getting the chair."

Derek cleared his throat to steal Spencer's attention and her brother straightened and cleared his throat. "Uh, Morgan, this is my sister, Elisabeth Reid. She's starting with the BAU today."

"She a genius too?" The man joked with a wonderful laugh.

"Technically speaking on the scale of intelligence quotient, she's what is considered 'high genius' with an IQ of 167, where my 187 is in the 'highest genius' portion of the scale."

"Charlie, he wasn't being serious."

Spencer looked down to her. "Don't call me that at work."

"Charlie?" Derek asked.

She liked his voice, rich. "It's his middle name."

He held his hand out, a strong hand, for her to shake. "Derek Morgan."

She took it and shook it slowly. He had soft hands. "Tessa."

"It's nice to meet you."

"Likewise."

They weren't shaking hands anymore, but their hands were still joined until they both simultaneously looked down at them and each pulled away. She frowned down at her hand, which still felt warm, and looked back to see him doing the same thing to his own.

"Well," Spencer said. "We should probably introduce you to the rest of the team."

"Right. It was nice to meet you... Derek."

"Tessa."

* * *

"What did you think?" He asked late that night, drinking that disgusting beverage with a wonderful aroma.

"I liked it. Is it bad to say I'm excited for our first case?"

"Not bad, but maybe it's just the perspective."

She sighed contently and leaned her head back on the couch. They were both sitting on the floor leaning against the furniture. She was drinking hot chocolate with a dollop of whipped cream, and he a mug of coffee with an inordinate amount of sugar and a spoon of ice cream

"How was mom doing when you saw her last?" He asked in a whisper like he was afraid to get the words out and hear them.

Elisabeth set her cup down very carefully and pet the top of Jack's head, who was laying partially in her lap. "She was fine, I suppose. She stared out of the window like I wasn't even there. I brought her a book, Arthur Conan Doyle like she used to read us, and read a few chapters- but she was just zoned."

He nodded to himself. "Do you ever wonder if we did the right thing? I mean, schizophrenia is a lifelong illness. She needed somewhere that could care for her."

" Charlie, of _course_ we did the right thing. I mean, it was the only thing to do. She's better there with people who know how to take care of her than with us or to be left to let herself go in our absence. We have to live our lives. Isn't that all she ever wanted for us?"

"You're right." He pulled her closer to wrap his arm around her. She leaned her head against his shoulder. Then their phones both dinged with a mass text and she felt a smile spread slowly across her face.

Her first case.

 _"_ _It snowed last year too: I made a snowman and my brother knocked it down and I knocked my brother down and then we had tea."_ _–_ _Dylan Thomas_

 **A/N: Soooo, written at the request of HannahV123. It will be a bit of a slow burn with a romance between Derek and Tessa, but it might start around the end of the first season beginning of second. I hope the names aren't too confusing. Let me break it down.**

 **My OC's name is Elisabeth, but she prefers to be called Tess or Tessa. Spencer calls her Beetle. She calls Spencer Charlie. Both are the only ones that call each other that. Their mom calls Spencer Crash and Tessa Lily. Derek may or may not come up with his own name for her and I am open to suggestions on that. Hope it doesn't get too complicated or confusing. Also, next chapter I think I'll just be referring to her as Tessa. Let me know what you think in the comment section below. Love always, Skye.**


	2. Tension

Chapter two: Tension

 _"The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary. Men alone are quite capable of every wickedness."_ _-Joseph Conrad._

Tessa and Spencer walked into the round table room an hour later, having changed out of their nightclothes that they'd already been in and she in a dark red, long sleeve, button down shirt tucked into a black pencil skirt with black pantyhose and pumps- he in a regular button down and corduroys, his tie not crooked for once, and minus the sweater vest because she told him it was the color of baby barf and the texture of an old lady's wig.

"Tuck that in," she fussed.

He slapped her hands away. "Leave it alone, it's fine."

"Charlie-"

"Are you two arguing again?" She stopped to look up at Derek, smirking with one side of his mouth and drinking a cup of coffee.

"Where is every one?" Spencer asked, looking around. Only JJ and Derek were there.

JJ was putting together some files. "Hotch is on his way, and Gideon is speaking downstairs."

"I'll go see if I can get anything from him," Spencer said, jumping at the chance. Tessa knew he admired the man greatly, damn near worshiping him, and she hoped Gideon didn't hurt him.

JJ handed him a file as well as she and Derek. Spencer left for Gideon as Hotch entered the room, receiving his own file. JJ started. "They're calling him the Seattle Strangler. He keeps his victims alive for seven days. The handle you'll see in the pictures is used as a bit of a crank."

"To better control the suffocation," Tessa commented.

Derek flipped to the picture she was on, but looked over her shoulder. "Is he looking to make it last?"

"He's wanting to enjoy it," Hotch answered before she could.

"Yeah, well, physical evidence is non existent, there are no real leads, and another girl just went missing."

"Well," Hotch said, tucking the file under his arm, "let's get up in the air. Where's Gideon and Reid?" No one said anything and he rolled his eyes. "The _other_ Reid."

"He went to go ask Gideon his opinion."

"No, we need him to come with us."

Derek tensed beside her. "Are you sure that's a good idea? Is he ready?"

Spencer had told her about Boston, and she felt guilty about being thankful it hadn't been him. He hadn't been there. Luckily, none of the BAU had been. But six agents. She couldn't imagine what was going through Gideon's mind right now.

She and Derek followed Hotch down to where Gideon and Spencer were. Gideon was the only one she had yet to meet. Derek handed Gideon a picture of the newest victim, twenty-two year old Heather Woodland. She downloaded an email right before lunch that had a time-delayed virus attached. It wiped her hard drive, leaving behind a message. _For heavens sake catch me before I kill more I cannot control myself_. William Heirens, The Lipstick Killer, 1945.

"He never catches them for more than seven days which means we have less than thirty-six hours to find her.

"Then we'd better get started."

* * *

"His first victim was 26 year old, Melissa Kirsh. Stab wounds, strangulation-"

Derek stopped him. "Wait a second, hold up. He stabbed her... and then strangled her to finish her off?"

"Other way around."

"Why do you think he started using the belt with the second murder?" Gideon asked.

Tessa was able to watch her brother answer, being in his element. "Strangulation with your bare hands is not as easy as one would believe. He tried, probably found that it took too long..."

"So he stabbed her instead."

"And realized it would be hours cleaning up the blood."

Derek nodded, glancing to Tessa sitting beside Spencer. "Next time, our boy's got a method- the belt."

Tessa frowned. "That can't make him very happy."

"What do you mean?" Gideon asked her.

"He can't feel their life leave them. The amount of pain and torture he inflicts would suggest he gets off on that sort of thing, but now he has to compromise for efficiency. That could cause him to lash out, either by killing more brutally or by acting different in his life that could help us. Making a mistake."

He held his hand out. "Jason Gideon."

"Elisabeth Reid. Please, call me Tessa."

* * *

Derek nudged Spencer on the way in to talk about Gideon. Tessa could tell that the man in question knew he was being questioned, but said nothing. She did, however, give Derek a look that she hoped he understood as 'cool it'.

"This is Special Agent Gideon, Special Agent Morgan, our expert on obsessional crimes, Doctors Reid and, uh, Reid, our experts on everything else."

Derek smirked. "Doctor?"

"Ancient Cultures. I asked him not to introduce me like that."

"They do with Reid so-"

She interrupted. "So people take him seriously. I know. I'm fine to let them think what they want. It will be that much more satisfying when I overcome their expectations."

"He's comfortable traveling with the body," Gideon said, looking at the pictures on the board.

Hotch finished his statement. "And owns a vehicle capable of concealing one."

Spencer spoke next. "1 in 7.4 drivers in Seattle owns an SUV."

"Explorer with tinted windows." Derek suggested.

Tessa shook her head. "Explorers rate higher with women."

"But how do we know it's his car? Ted Bundy drove a VW Bug."

"What about a Jeep Cherokee?"

"Jeeps are more masculine," Spencer agreed.

"And we know how the unsubs feel about asserting their masculinity."

Tessa turned from the board. "When did the bureau become part of the investigation?"

The man, she couldn't remember his name, answered with crossed arms. "After the fourth body."

That was the one dumped over state lines.

"Do you think he did that on purpose?"

"If so, knowledge of law enforcement does suggest a criminal record."

Tessa moved to lean against a desk facing the boards. "Except, that's fairly common knowledge. Especially with the rise in procedural television."

"Do you want to see our suspect list?"

"No, we won't look at a suspect list until we come up with the profile. It keeps our perspective unbiased."

Gideon nodded toward everyone. "When do we sit down with your task force?"

"Four o clock."

"An accurate profile by four o clock today?" Derek questioned.

Obviously Gideon was less concerned by it, which Tessa could tell made Derek _more_ concerned. "Agent Gideon," Hotch said, "where would you like to start?"

He pointed to a picture. "At the site of the last murder."

* * *

As soon as Spencer stepped into the house behind Tessa, the dog barked at him and he jumped. Tessa chuckled and even Hotch smirked. The blonde man pulled her back.

"Sandy. No, no, no, no. I'm so sorry."

Hotch motioned. "Oh, it's okay. It's what we call the Reid Effect. Happens with children too. I'm Agent Hotchner. This is Doctors Spencer and Elisabeth Reid."

"Oh. You both look too young to have gone to medical school."

Spencer held his jacket against him in protection as he moved closer and around the beautiful dog, who walked up to Tessa with a sloppy tongue hanging out and begging for pets. Spencer glared at her as she knelt to scruffle his ears.

"They're PhD's," Spencer said. "Three of them. She has one."

"What are you two, some kind of genius' or something?"

Tessa stood from petting Sandy as her brother explained himself. "I don't believe intelligence can be accurately quantified, but I do have an IQ of 187, an eidetic memory, and can read 20,000 words per minute."

There was the ticking of a particularly loud clock somewhere and Tessa jumped in. "Yes, he's a genius."

Hotch smirked at his own resident genius and Tessa made a face at him when no one was looking. "Sandy, you get a lot of attention don't you?"

"Yeah, Heather loves this dog. I feed her when Heather's away and usually she's fine, but lately she won't eat it's almost like she can sense something's wrong."

"Not sense," Spencer said. "Smell. Our apocrine sweat glands releases secretions in response to emotional stress."

Tessa moved over to a stack of magazines and flipped through the covers. "Sandy's worried because she knows you are," she said to clear up the feeling of confusion he was no doubt feeling. "Charlie, come look at these."

Spencer didn't tell her again not to call him that at work, for which she was grateful because she wouldn't have obliged. He looked at them too. "David, does your sister own a Datsun Z?"

"No, but she's in the market for one. How'd you know?"

Tessa held up the magazine. Sandy barked again, either at Spencer or to get Tessa's attention, and the brother took her outside.

"There's an immediate relationship established between a buyer and a seller," Spencer said. "A level of trust. If I want to coax a young woman into my car..."

"You'd offer her a test drive."

They left after that and in the car, from the front seat, Tessa looked back with a smirk. "The Reid Effect?"

"We may have to come up with a better name," Hotch muttered. "It seems you are the opposite."

"Tessa always gets along with the animals," Spencer said. "I have yet to meet one that didn't to tear my leg off."

"That's not true," Tessa said. "Jack loves you."

Hotch frowned. "Jack. I like that."

* * *

Derek and Gideon were already there when they got back to the room they were set up in. They all sat in their seats around a table, with the exception of Derek who was pacing and tossing a ball up to catch. Spencer had his legs up in the seat with him, spinning around in it, and Tessa was sitting on hers.

"Okay," Derek said. "Then how 'bout the fact that on one hand, we have paranoid psychosis... but the autopsy protocol says what?"

"Adhesive residue shows he put layer after layer of duct tape over his victims eyes."

Tessa put her hand out to stop his spinning and he pouted a bit.

"He knows he wants to kill them, but he still covers their eyes. He doesn't want them looking at him, apparently."

"That could suggest that he's in a position where he doesn't want anyone to be able to get a description. Maybe his job is one of authority." Tessa said.

"Okay," Derek conceded, "but then he takes the body and dumps it right out in the open, murder weapon nearby."

"Not the M.O. Of a paranoid convinced he's being watched or under surveillance."

"Paranoid psychosis, but behavior that's not paranoid."

"Maybe he's schizophrenic," Spencer suggested.

Tessa frowned. "Maybe we're looking for two different people."

Hotch jumped on the trail of thought and she caught a smile from Derek. "The one killing would be the dominant one, the one afraid of being identified. The one dumping the body would be the younger one, unconcerned that he may be caught."

"Or he thinks the other will be able to save him."

"This suggests the older one killing may have a criminal record."

Gideon, who had been zoned out the entire time over by the board, interrupted. "Let's tell them we're ready."

Derek disagreed right away. "We don't have enough for a profile. We _just_ started looking at this with two unsubs."

Gideon left without answering or commenting to what Derek said and Tessa sighed, standing up out of her chair and smoothing out her skirt. Derek stared at the door, his mouth open but not gaping and Spencer leaned forward to write something. Probably a comment about Gideon's behavior.

"Reid," he said. "You're good with this? Tessa? We've got a woman who's only got a few hours left to live, an incomplete profile, and a Unit Chief on the verge of a nervous breakdown."

"They don't call them nervous breakdowns anymore," Tessa told him at the same time as Gideon, who came in to pick something up off of the table. Derek glared at nothing and looked over at Tessa, who blushed and ducked her head, her hand on her brother's shoulder.

"It's called a major depressive episode," Spencer informed him and Tessa bit back a grin.

"I know, Reid."

* * *

"We have two unidentified subjects, both white males. One will be in his late twenties, this will be the over confident one. He'll most likely be the one dealing with the bodies after their death and the submissive in this dynamic. The dominant will most likely be in his mid to late thirties, more cautious and our killer.

"Neither are someone you would notice at first glance. They both blend in to any crowd. The violent natures of the crime suggests a previous criminal record for either or both unsubs. Petty crimes. Maybe auto theft. We've classified them as organized killers. Careful as a whole. Psychopathic as opposed to psychotic. He follows the news, has good hygiene. He's smart. We're loathe to say one is the brains over the other. It appears to be fairly even, which means the only physical evidence you'll find is what they wanted you to.

"Mobile. It's more likely our submissive unsub is not, relying perhaps on a public transport or another, but the dominant has a car in good condition. Our guess- Jeep Cherokee, tinted windows. The murders have all involved rapes. But rape without penetration. The one killing, the dominant, is likely doing this as a show for the other. This likely tells us that he is sexually inadequate. Psychiatric evaluations or the submissive will show a history of paranoia stemming from a childhood trauma- death of a parent or family member. And now he feels persecuted and watched. Murder gives them both a combined sense of power..."

Watching Gideon give their profile, Spencer continued jotting down things in his little notebook. He'd always carried one around in his pocket. She usually wrote on the back of her hands and the insides of her wrist. Spencer always hated this, buying her little notebooks that he hid in opportune locations around her house, in her car, her purse, that she kept for doodling.

* * *

Elle Greenway. Tessa waited in the house down the street for the girl, who was said to be starting the BAU as well soon, walked to one of the unsubs house to lure him out for an arrest. Richard Slessman. Tessa waited in the dark between Spencer and Derek, closer to the latter. Then they heard the voices.

"Are you sure you locked it?" That had to be Slessman.

"Yeah."

The door creaked open and Tessa felt like she could feel the heaviness of her breath in front of her lips. "Hello?" The footsteps got closer. "Hello!"

"FBI! Freeze!"

They all came out and trained their guns on him as Elle took him down to arrest him. Gideon came in from the back and Tessa caught the conceited smirk Slessman gave him.

 _"_ _All is riddle, and the key to a riddle... is another riddle." -Emerson_

"There's no sign of the girl here," Spencer told Gideon. "We can arrest him with probable cause, but we won't be able to hold him. Slessman's been at the top of the suspect list."

"Is that the mother?"

"Grandmother," Elle answered. "The mother died in a fire when he was thirteen."

Gideon passed Tessa and Derek, "Probably not the only fire in his childhood."

Spencer leaned against the open door frame and laid placed a comforting hand on Tessa's back. "Before his Son of Sam murders, David Berkowitz set a multitude of fires."

"Exactly how many is a multitude?"

Tessa moved to follow Gideon with Derek moving right behind her, like a magnet. "One thousand, four hundred and eighty eight," she answered.

"Luring him out was your idea, right? Greenway?"

"Elle," she corrected. "I don't send a SWAT team into a house with children."

"Hotch says your background is in sex offender cases. What can you tell us?"

Tessa caught Derek glancing at her in the corner of her eye and she looked over to see him wink at her. She smiled and rolled her eyes. "You think you're cute," she accused in a whisper.

"Princess, I _am_ cute," he told her, leaning his arm on the door frame and giving her a side grin. "And any other adjective you can think of."

Spencer, who was standing beside them, frowned. "I don't think I'm comfortable with you calling my sister Princess."

"Why not?" Derek asked.

"Because the next step, like you and Garcia, will be flirting constantly and making innuendos and I'm not okay with that. Her name is Elisabeth. Or Tessa."

Tessa smirked and shared a look with Derek as they moved towards the stairs. "Oh, you handsome devil, who else would I be _but_ your princess?"

Then she leaned on him playfully as they went upstairs, chuckling. Spencer glared at Derek before going back downstairs. She sobered and followed Derek to Slessman's room where two officers were trying to get into the computer. Derek frowned.

"Something's not right," he said. "This is a boy's room. Not a man's."

She glanced around with a bit of an agreement. Then one of the officers held up a slip of paper. "Log in password."

"No!" Tessa and Derek both said. Too late. There was a beep and a whir and then it was off. The officer sitting typed in a few keys and frowned.

"It's not coming back on."

"And it won't." Derek told them. "It was a false password."

Elle, Gideon, and Spencer joined them in Slessman's room and Tessa and Derek were both thinking. They needed a password as Derek was able to get the screen back up.

"What's the number six at the bottom of the screen?"

Derek answered irritably. "Number of password attempts before the program wipes the hard drive."

"There could be an email or a journal in the computer, something that tells us who the partner is or where Heather is being kept. Do you think you can break in?"

"In six tries?" Tessa asked.

Gideon quoted, "Try again. Fail again. Fail better."

Samuel Beckett. "Samuel Beckett," Spencer told Derek. She loved seeing her brother's dynamic in the team. Especially as the middle, explaining things to either side.

Derek stared and quoted his own to contradict. "Try not. Do or do not."

Tessa answered this one. "Yoda."

Gideon grabbed a book off of the shelf and flipped through, stopping on a page and leaving to go talk to Slessman.

* * *

"You've reached Penelope Garcia in the FBI's office of Supreme Genius."

"You're on speaker. You got me and Kitten."

The person on the other side of the call gasped excitedly. "Does our _new_ Dr. Reid have a new nickname? I shall be vigilant with it. What do you need?"

"We got a program called Deadbolt Defense and a girl with only a couple hours to live, so what do you know?"

"Then you got a problem. Deadbolt's the number one password crack resistant software there is. You're gonna have to get inside this guy's head to get the password."

Derek sighed and Tessa collapsed onto the bed on her back. The sides were almost coming undone. He tossed a lot and the little time she saw him, he had dark circles so he must have trouble sleeping.

"I thought I was calling the Office of Supreme Genius."

"Well, gorgeous, you've been rerouted to the office of Too Friggin' Bad."

"Thanks anyway." He hung up and looked over at Tessa. "What are you doing?"

She patted the spot beside her. "Trying to get inside his head. He's an insomniac."

She angled herself to look above her and found a CD player in the headboard. So he listened to music. There were CD's and Derek grabbed those, getting up and going over to a CD stand- calling the other officers for help in going through them.

"We're going through everyone of these CD's. Scratches, wear and tear. I wanna know which CD he plays the most. Let's go."

Spencer entered the room with them and soon it was just the three of them, Spencer sitting in the middle of the bed spinning a CD case that was empty, Derek walking back and forth by the door, and Tessa with her legs piled in the computer chair and herself sitting on them.

"Empty," Spencer said.

"Like the Sinatra case I had." She said.

"You never found the disk?" He asked. They would listen to Frank Sinatra while they talked. Forever ago now, she lost her favorite of his CD's and had to buy a new one until she found it.

"Yeah, it was-" Tessa stopped and began to laugh, sitting up straighter from her slouch and moving over to open the disk tray, holding up the CD within. "It was in the radio. I never took it out."

Spencer climbed up out of the bed and over to where she was, he and Derek both moving to stand behind her. "Beetle, you are amazing."

"Beetle?" Derek questioned.

"Thanks, but what song?"

Spencer looked at the song list on the case. "Enter Sandman."

Tessa typed it in quickly and the screen came up. She gasped softly in shock and Derek sighed, dropping his head and moving to call Gideon. Heather was alive, in a cage with duct tape over her eyes. There was something about it though.

"Tessa," Spencer said. "Show the last twelve images lined up next to each other."

She typed the command and hit enter. Spencer pointed to the screen. "There, do you see the hanging light fixture?"

"What about it?" Then, a breath of realization. "It's shifting positions like it's swaying. Derek, she's on a boat. A pier or a dock. Otherwise they wouldn't be able to transmit the video."

"I'll call Hotch."

Tessa looked up at Spencer and he kissed her forehead, pausing as he pulled away, looking at the screen. "Morgan, he's back."

* * *

By the time they got to the shipyard, Gideon had been shot, and the medics were on the scene patching him up. Heather was alive. Gideon was in his concentrated silence. Tessa confident that Elle would be soon joining the BAU.

"You did good," Derek said, walking up behind her, watching the scene of red and blue lights from afar.

"Thank you," she said. "We make a good team."

"I agree, though maybe not as good a team as you and Reid. It's strange to think of him having a sister."

She rubbed her hands up her arms. "He's my best friend. Really, he's my only friend. He and I have always been close."

"What would you say if I said _I_ wanted to be your best friend?"

Tessa turned around. "I'd say that that sounds very... doable." She smiled and put her hand out like he had when they met. "Hi, I'm Tessa. We're best friends now and there's nothing you can do about it."

He shook her hand. "I'm Derek and I'm more likely to use my own name for you than any other you may prefer."

"Am I to be dubbed 'princess' then?"

"If you don't mind."

"I like it. In that case, I may call you 'Charming'. I mean, you think you are anyway."

She heard Spencer call her and moved away. "I'm being summoned."

"Milady," he joked, bowing.

"My liege," she quipped back, going off to find Spencer.

When she did, he looked agitated. "Where were you?" He asked upon seeing her, taking off his jacket to place on her shoulders.

"I was talking to Derek."

He made a face. "I don't like that. He flirts with you."

"Charlie, he flirts with _everyone_."

"Not everyone is my little sister."

"Charlie-"

"Speaking of," he cut her off. "I think you should leave the FBI."

Tessa groaned. "Spencer, stop it."

He looked startled that she called him by his name. "Elisabeth, seeing Gideon hurt-"

"That's Gideon, not me."

"But one day it _could_ be you. This is dangerous and I don't want you in it."

She glared. "I don't remember asking."

"You didn't have to. I'm telling you to leave because I love you and I worry about you."

"You're _telling_ me?" She asked in a shrill whisper. "You aren't my boss, you're my brother. If you think it's so dangerous, why don't _you_ leave? That's a bit hypocritical for you to _tell_ me to leave because I could get hurt and stay yourself when you're more likely to be targeted in a close range by a gun than I am. Statistically, you _know_ that."

"Why are you being so stubborn about this?" He asked angrily, his hands in his hair and then holding her face gently.

"Why are you being so difficult?" She asked with just as much anger, pulling harshly away from him. "I'm _good_ at my job, Charlie. You _know_ I am. I can do this. Why can't you just accept that?"

He didn't say anything else, choosing to walk away the way he did when he knew that anything else he could say he wouldn't be able to take back. Their mother had instilled that habit with them both, but she always hated when one of them had to.

* * *

Neither of them spoke to each other until they boarded the jet and then they both sat on opposite ends of it, the unspoken tension between them clear to the rest. She opened her purse to get her music player out and found one of the little notebooks he hid and pushed it aside, putting one earbud in her ear and pressing play. She hadn't done or said anything she should apologize for and she was determined to stand her ground. She had worked hard to get here.

This had been hers and Spencer's dream since they were little, the Behavioral Analysis Unit and catching killers as an unstoppable duo. When he graduated high school at twelve, they made their plan of action to get there. When she graduated high school three years later, They moved it up. He proceeded to get three PhD's in mathematics, chemistry, and engineering. She her own in psychology as well as a bachelor in both theology and philosophy. She'd followed her brother into the FBI and then the BAU just as they planned. When he entered first, that was when they began this train of disagreement.

"What are you and Pretty Boy being all angry at each other for?"

Tessa broke from her thoughts and looked to Derek, who stole the seat across from her with his own headphones on and and crooked smile. "Nothing," she said.

"Wow. That's a serious nothing for the amount of tension in this jet."

"Derek, please. It was just a disagreement."

He sighed. "Let me guess, he's afraid of you getting hurt with this job." She glanced over at him. "I have two younger sisters of my own. I can't tell you the trouble I would have if they wanted to do this job."

"This has been our dream together since we were kids though. Fighting crime side by side. Then he changed his mind. I just, I wish I could make him understand that this is all I've ever wanted- _we_ wanted. I couldn't imagine doing anything else. I wouldn't want to."

"He'll come around. He's just being a big brother."

"Five minutes," she muttered. "Just five minutes."

* * *

Spencer didn't ride home with her, instead going off with Derek in his car before Tessa had even caught up. She sighed and walked to her old yellow jeep that she and Spencer had always nicknamed The School Bus. That's what it looked like. Tessa laid her forehead against the steering wheel and started the car.

Jack jumped in excitement when she was home. She'd asked a kid down the street to watch him for a few days, pet him, play with him, make sure he had food and water. She missed her puppy. Spencer always said it was ridiculous that she called him her puppy when he was four years old and no longer a puppy.

"Hey, Jackie. I missed you. Were you good for Mackenzie?"

Of course her only answer was a tilted head and whine. She sighed and set her keys in the smoking stand beside the door that she used for random things. She loved going to old flea markets and finding smoking stands, using them for small tables which drove Spencer insane as they were not meant to be multi-functional household devices.

It was late, or early, depending on how you wanted to look at it as it was currently ten minutes to three in the morning. She'd been up for almost thirty-six hours. Tessa moved to her room and changed into her night clothes, an old T-shirt and shorts and turned the television on. A Monster in Paris was on, an old favorite and one of the few movies she could fall asleep to. She was almost asleep when she heard her front door open.

Instantly her eyes were open and she sat up, careful to stay quiet. She was sure that she locked the door. Tessa quietly moved to the small safe behind a painting and opened it, pulling her gun out and moving towards the door.

It was just Spencer.

"Jesus, Charlie, I almost shot you!"

"I, uh, look. I know I'm being overly dramatic and I'm sorry. I just, it's you and me, Beetle. It's always been you and me. I couldn't stand it if anything happened to you, you're my best friend, my sister, my favorite person in the world. I will try not to argue about you being in the BAU with me, but you have to promise not to put yourself in any unnecessary danger. Please."

Tessa launched herself at him in a tight hug. "I love you, Charlie. Of course I promise. You're my brother, and I'm just as worried about you. I'll be careful if you are."

He pulled away after hugging her back. "I, uh, I brought you a smoothie, strawberry, just like you like it. And a candy bar."

She grinned and took them from him. "Do you wanna watch A Monster In Paris with me?"

"You know I hate that movie," he told her. "It's ridiculous that they think a few random chemicals can make a flea eight feet tall, and an additional set of chemicals to make it sing." Then, "Of course I want to watch it with you."

 _"_ _There is no love without forgiveness, and there is no forgiveness without love" -Bryant H. McGill_

 **A/N: Sooo, let me know what you think of her argument with Spencer and her interactions with Derek. A Monster in Paris is a real movie, though its from 2011. I love it and yes, it really is about a singing flea. I feel like you guys probably think I'm on drugs by now. I have a younger brother, but a really good friend I consider my brother who is older. Though neither are really like this at all.**

 **I love coffee and I probably use AT LEAST as much sugar as Spencer, but I LOVE strawberry smoothies, especially the minute maid ones. They're my favorite. Blah blah blah, sorry I talk so much. Anyway. Let me know what you all think. I love all the comments. I am also always open to ideas and suggestions if you have an idea for a direction this or any other of my stories can go. Love always, Skye.**


	3. Imitation

Chapter three: Imitation

 _"Almost all absurdity of conduct arises from the imitation of those whom we cannot resemble." -Samuel Johnson._

"I don't like that one."

"At least try it on."

"I don't want to."

"Please?"

They stared each other down in the middle of the store, surrounded by clothes. Someone squeezed by to grab a tie and they continued.

"I don't even know why we have to do this."

Tessa sighed. "Charlie, I love you. But you dressed like a homeless person in his eighties, not the young, handsome FBI agent I know."

He looked at the pile of clothes she held in her arms. "Fine, but I'm not cutting my hair."

"I wasn't going to ask you to." She said with a grin, holding the pile out for him to try on.

Spencer took it with a grumble and disappeared into the dressing rooms. Her phone dinged with a text and she looked down. Derek.

 _How's it going?_

 **Not as difficult as I thought it would be.** She texted back.

Spencer came out of the dressing room again in a dark purple button up shirt, a navy buttoned vest, and a tie. She grinned.

"That's perfect! You're going to be breaking hearts."

"I thought that was a bad thing."

"It's an expression, Charlie. Now, give a turn." He did, with a very sarcastic body language tone that made her sigh. "You know, this would be over quicker if you'd just cooperate."

"I am cooperating!"

"With an attitude! Don't make me force you, because I will. Now go try the black one."

He groaned and turned around, going back into the dressing room. "I'm not a child, Tess."

"No, you dressed better then."

"Ha ha." He commented dryly, coming out in the black button up. Tessa clapped and motioned for him to spin. He needed something, something... she plucked a white silk tie off of the nearby rack and threw it over his shoulder.

"Perfect, but you cannot get anything on it. I've seen you eat spaghetti."

"It's not my fault tomato sauce has a vendetta against me."

"You could eat slower," she pointed out. "And actually pay attention to what you're eating instead of what you're reading. How many of your books have food stains on the pages? Or coffee stains?"

"And you're any better?" He asked, going in to change again, this time coming out in a maroon button up and charcoal gray vest. "I've seen you wake up with marker tracks on your face because you fell asleep on your arm. What do you even _do_ with the notebooks I get you?"

"I make art."

"Doodling isn't art."

"Mine are."

"Can we be done?"

Tessa looked at his face and sighed. "Yes, we can be done. Go get dressed, I'll take this to the counter."

She was interrupted by the Imperial March, a ringtone only one person on her phone had because it meant they had a case. Spencer frowned at her phone as she opened the text.

"You put Vader's March on your phone."

"Don't get excited, we have a case."

* * *

Tessa didn't know a lot about bombs, the bombers she could profile, but she couldn't look at a picture like she was at the moment and know what it could tell. Like Derek was doing. When Hotch and Gideon came into the room, he passed the pictures to Gideon to peruse.

"Pipe bombs."

If he said so. To Tessa it just looked like a bunch of random parts had been put into a blender. They were being delivered in cardboard boxes to front door steps.

"Mercury activated."

She frowned. "What does that mean?"

"There are contacts to a detonator," Spencer explained, "on either end of a bent tube full of mercury."

"What it means is all you have to do is tilt the package to detonate it."

"So the bomber had to deliver them himself." Elle realized.

"Exactly."

Tessa frowned. "That's incredibly risky. Our unsub is either very confident or completely comfortable around explosives. My hands would be shaking if I knew I were carrying something like that. And he probably delivers them on foot or drives almost at walking speed to insure that it doesn't go off ahead of time."

"Strange way to commit an act of terrorism," Hotch said. "Why go through all that trouble to kill just a few people?"

"Let's recommend not raising the terror alert level for now. No reason to spread panic."

The door opened and JJ came in. "We got news." She clicked on the TV. "This is just a local channel, but the coverage is everywhere now- CNN, FOX, MSNBC, Al Jazeera, you name it."

"So much for not spreading panic."

Tessa watched the news feed from her spot beside Derek. Gideon smacked his lips in a thinking fashion and sighed. "If DHS doesn't raise the terror alert now, they'll look weak."

"Make sure Homeland Security knows that this is everywhere."

The video on screen exploded again with apparently another bomb and everyone jumped. They were going to Palm Beach, Derek staying behind to examine the bomb fragments. He caught her on the way out, waiting until everyone- including Spencer- had passed. He pointed.

"Nice job."

Spencer had worn the maroon and charcoal gray, and Tessa was even able to run her fingers through his hair where it looked somewhat respectable. She noticed he walked more confidently too.

"I know right. Am I good, or am I good?"

"Princess, you're amazing."

"I know," she laughed, walking towards the door. He caught her arm to stop her.

"Hey, be careful."

She smiled. "I'm always careful," she lied.

* * *

The bombs all happened within three miles of each other, with the first victim being seventy-four year old widow, Barbara Keller. Two hours later, Clurman was hit in his driveway. And forty-five minutes later was the bomb they saw on the live news footage. Jill Swenson, thirty-four year old housewife who lived across the street from Clurman. Clurman was the only survivor of the three.

"Is there any connection between the victims?"

Tessa bit back a grin. Spencer spoke louder and clearer with his new clothes.

"One. Clurman was a partner in a ten million dollar condo development deal in which Keller was an investor, and a few weeks ago, the whole deal went bust."

"Went bust how?"

"Geologists discovered that the land was on methane, the condos never got built, the land became worthless, and Clurman lost a lot of people a lot of money."

"So maybe one of them was mad enough to take aim at Clurman." Spencer suggested.

"If that were the case," Tessa disagreed, "they would have taken aim at him alone, not the others that were just as victim."

Spencer shrugged. "Unless they did the other bombs to cover up the true intentions."

"Oh, let's not get ahead of ourselves," Gideon said. "It's a little too early to theorize about motive."

"Then where do we start?"

"From the beginning. What do we know about bombers?"

Spencer answered. "Mostly male, loners, history of criminal activity. About fifty percent of all bombing are actually the product of vandalism."

"And more often than not, bombers end up accidentally blowing themselves up, so the first suspect you always look for in the bombing case are the victims."

"Clurman was the only male," Elle pointed out. "Losing a large business deal like that it could be a powerful stresser."

Tessa didn't think he had the motive. If it were him, why choose _these_ victims? Clurman was the only victim who didn't get hit at his door.

* * *

Tessa did not like Florida. Maybe she would, if she were here to spend the entire time either in front of an air conditioner or at the beach- but standing out in the hot sun in white skinny jeans, a white button up with the sleeves rolled up, and an unbuttoned black vest, it was freaking hot. Her nose was sweating under the large sunglasses and without them she was blinded by the sun.

"Before Clurman passed out, what he told cops at the time was that he saw the package sitting on the stoop outside his kitchen door."

"Why didn't he take it in?" Elle was still going with the 'Clurman is the unsub angle'.

Spencer and Tessa circled the car, taking in the entirety of the scene. "Why didn't it go off until he got to his car? It's like fifty feet away."

"If our unsub can bring it from wherever he lives to the victims homes," Tessa pointed out, "it shouldn't be too outrageous to think that he could get to his car. He's on his way out, sees the package, takes it with him. It goes off as he's putting it in his car."

"Joe Reese, one of Clurman's investors, was here before the bomb went off. The cops have ruled him out as a suspect, but he said he saw Clurman get in the car with the package."

"So maybe Clurman wasn't receiving a bomb at all," Elle said. "Maybe he was on his way to deliver one."

Tessa frowned and Gideon noticed, looking at her as if trying to determine something. Neither had really talked to each other much, but more often than not they were on the same page theory wise.

"I'd like to talk to Clurman," he said. "In the meantime, let's get a warrant to search his house. Tessa, you and Reid come to the hospital with me."

She found it rather amusing that everyone still called him Reid, but had taken to calling her Tessa. She supposed it _would_ be odd to have to call Reid and for her and Spencer to ask which one.

* * *

"What can you tell us about the package, Mr. Clurman?"

Tessa hated hospitals. "I thought I knew what it was," the man said in the hospital bed. "Pot for an orchid. I collect them. I ordered the pot through the mail."

"Why didn't you take it inside?" Gideon asked.

Tessa's hands were shaking and Spencer subtly laced his fingers with hers. She didn't used to hate hospitals. When she was a kid, they were just another building. But when she was twelve, the time Spencer was graduating their high school, she got sick. Really sick. The doctors thought she wasn't going to make it. She was in the hospital for nine weeks.

"It was for my office. I was going there anyway. Thought I'd take it with me. That's the last thing I remember."

"You had an argument with Joe Reese. Do you remember that?"

He slurred just slightly. "Joe was there?"

"He was angry, he accused you of blowing him off." There was a pause as Clurman made some sound of acknowledgment. "Any reason he'd want to hurt you?"

"Joe? No. I mean, he's a confrontational guy, but if he wanted to kill me, he'd just beat me to death."

"A lot of people were angry about that deal falling apart, and they were angry at you. I don't know, how does that make you feel?"

"I felt awful. I thought those condos would make a lot of money for a lot of people, myself included. I thought that geologist was legit. He didn't even take samples. He scammed us. All those investors that lost their money. Barbara."

"Barbara Keller."

"The first victim," Spencer reminded.

"What about her?"

"It's just such a shame. Such a nice lady, you know? It was such an easy sale. Sometime... I felt like I took advantage of her because she's old and lonely. Now, she's dead. Well... I feel terrible. Ow!"

Gideon moved closer. "What is it?"

"Ah! My foot."

No one said anything, but Tessa could see Spencer in the corner of her eye sneak a glance towards the end of the bed where his legs stopped at the calf. Did no one tell him? Gideon didn't say anything either for a moment and then he probably thought it was time to go.

"I'll get you some help."

Tessa and Spencer followed him out where he called Hotch. Along the way, Tessa could hear beeps from random machines from random rooms.

"This isn't our guy," he told Hotch. "His answers were coherent, even while he was sedated. He's got a sense of humor, displays empathy..."

"Not to mention he has a hobby unrelated to bomb making," Spencer added.

Gideon agreed. "This is nothing like a typical bomber profile..." Tessa couldn't hear Hotch's response. "Well, we'll see if the fragments match at the bomb scene, but I doubt they will."

* * *

"Morgan emailed these over. The three on the left are the bombs from yesterday. The one on the right's from the evidence room at Quantico."

Everyone crowded to look at the four identical bombs. Spencer pointed this out. There was something familiar about this.

"Made with steel reinforcement rods," Spencer also pointed out. Again, if he said so.

"Adrian Bale."

There was a ringing of silence after Gideon said the name and Tessa remembered that she'd seen the picture of one of his bombs in the paper after the Boston incident that killed six agents under Gideon's watch. Spencer had been there, standing outside with Gideon at the time the bomb had gone off inside and the building was brought down on top of the seven bodies that had already been killed on impact. She had been terrified for him and thinking about it now made her wonder why he was worried about _her_ when _he_ was the danger magnet.

"He held our agents in a standoff in Boston last year," Hotch told Morrison. "He took out six of our agents and a hostage with one of his bombs."

"So you're thinking he's behind this?"

"Possibly, but he's in prison."

Spencer thought aloud. "He's got kind of a cult following, like Charles Manson. It could just be a copycat."

"There's one way to find out. Let's put the screws to this guy."

Gideon took a sip of water and used it to clear his throat so he could speak. "No, no, no. Bale's too smart. If we want information from him we have to handle him carefully, and even then we have to assume that road will lead no where."

"So you're the connection to bale doesn't help at all?"

"No," Tessa said. "He's just saying to let us handle Bale."

Morrison visibly relaxed marginally. "Look, we just heard from local Texas P.D. You were right about Clurman's nephew. He admitted the bomb stuff was his, which is great for the Clurmans, but it leaves us with zero suspects. So what do you suggest my men do now?"

"Proceed from the profile."

"I didn't know we had a profile."

* * *

"When we're dealing with a bomber, we're talking about someone who's non-confrontational. If you bumped into him in a cafe, he'd apologize. Even if it wasn't his fault."

"We would classify this bomber as highly organized based on the meticulous design of his bombs. It means above average intelligence. He probably has a skilled job, a trade, one that allows him to work alone. That's how he was able to make a sophisticated device without raising suspicion. Furniture maker, jeweler, et cetera."

"Background in explosives?"

"Not necessarily. You're thinking about a type who like to blow things up. Gives them an emotional or sexual release. Death, secondary."

Some non player character asked, "Then what's this guy doing?"

"Murdering. Bombs? Just weapons. And these attack, they are not random."

"Well, how do you know that?"

"By process of elimination," Hotch told him. "We know bombers fall into a discreet number of categories according to motive. There's the terrorist whose aim is to spread fear. We expect him to strike in a populous area like a subway. There's the politically motivated bomber. He makes a statement by choosing a symbolic target like an abortion clinic. Then there's our unsub. He made bombs designed to kill and he chose his victims specifically by placing the bombs at their stoops. That tells us he has a direct motive. Statistically, he bombs for profit or to conceal a crime. And it tells us how we're going to find him- through the people he killed."

Tessa looked around the building at the officers, each looking like they didn't have a clue what Hotch and Gideon were talking about. One of them was doodling.

"Somewhere among the three victims, there is a direct motive. Keep digging."

The man that had been doodling, finally looked alive and everyone began to disperse.

* * *

Tessa wasn't sure it was such a good idea for Gideon to be one of the ones going to see Bale, much less the one to talk to him.

"You're insane," Spencer scolded her under his breath. "Now you're sounding like Morgan."

"I'm not saying I don't trust his judgment, because I do. I'm just saying that maybe it's too soon for him to be face to face with the man again. He's too emotional about the topic. I don't want to be visiting him in jail because Bale was a douche and Gideon killed him."

He sighed. "That's ridiculous, Beetle." Pause. "He wouldn't get caught."

"I can hear you two."

Tessa's face went red as Gideon went into the little room with Adrian Bale, the latter trying and failing miserably to hide the arrogant smirk on his face. Gideon leaned casually against the wall for a few beats.

"You know why I'm here?"

Bale shrugged. "This guy in Palm Beach, right? The Palm Beach Bomber. Somebody's got to give him a better name."

Gideon took a deep breath. "He uses your bombs, your designs."

"Well, he should be careful. Those things are dangerous."

"Adrian... you can't fool me. If you're involved in this in any way and you do not help me,I will make your life even worse than it is now."

"Oh, but no, actually, I can fool you because I've fooled you before. And now there's another me out there, watching, waiting."

Gideon took another deep breath and sat down, folding his hands. "You were more ruthless than I expected. If you hadn't pushed that button, you might've had a chance at parole someday."

"Yeah. You know, I've thought a lot about that day, and there's one thing I still can't understand. You trusted me. Why?"

Gideon frowned and brought his brows together. "I never trusted you."

"You listened to me."

"I made an error. I calculated you wouldn't do it, and you did. Whatever you think, I'm gonna walk outta here, and you never will."

Bale sniffed and angled his body towards Gideon, folding his own hands. "Here's what I think. Sending those agents into that warehouse, it just doesn't make sense. I mean, I've read your books. I had all those things- what did you call it? Homicidal triad." He chuckled. "I even came from a broken family, classic sociopath, so when I had the chance to kill six agents plus a hostage, I mean, just because I gave myself up doesn't mean that I was finished with those people. I still had the remote. You... you should've known that. And the emotional release I feel by pressing that button... well, that was just a little too overwhelming to pass up. Why didn't you search me before sending those agents in?"

"He isn't involved," Tessa said quietly.

"Why do you say that?"

"He only cares about gloating to Gideon, he isn't teasing him with facts and bits we missed. But I'll bet that after we leave, he'll try getting involved. Issue out some sort of warning."

Spencer turned to the guard beside them. "Does he have any internet time?"

"He has an hour after he's done here. Why?"

Spencer turned back to Tessa. "I'm going to see about staying here so we can where he goes and find out from there who are unsub is."

Gideon stepped out into the hall to meet them when he was done. "Bale may be part of this, but he's not in control of it. If he were, he would have taunted me with specifics."

"So what's our next move," Hotch asked on Tessa's speakerphone. There had been another attempted one.

"I let Bale know the unsub's using his designs."

"Bait."

"Yeah, exactly. If Bale wasn't part of it before, he'll sure want to be part of it now."

Spencer motioned for them to stop walking out. "I'm gonna stay behind and monitor his mail, calls, visitors, any contact he has with the outside world including... the guard informed us that he has internet time."

"Good. Even if he doesn't know the unsub he may want to try to contact him. Tessa, come on."

Tessa smiled to her brother and followed Gideon out with a clear expression between the two to be careful.

* * *

"186 emails through the ISP," Spencer's voice said over the speakerphone, "we were able to track down the names and some of the addresses, but none of them were in Palm Beach."

"How about occupations?" Gideon asked tiredly.

"It wasn't really a required field, so really, only about a third of them are filled in."

Tessa and Gideon started their sentence at the same time and Gideon stopped, gesturing for her to speak. She sat back and pulled her leg up to rest her chin on her knee. "The unsub takes pride in his work. He'd fill it out just because he can."

"You're right." She never got tired of hearing Spencer tell her that. "Let's see, We have 'trucker, physician, antiquities dealer, store owner, orderly..."

"Wait." She and Gideon both spoke at the same time again and this time she waved for him to continue their shared thought. "Antiquities dealer?"

"Yeah. Why, what is it?"

"Barbara Keller collected coins."

When Gideon and Tessa hung up, Gideon sat back and stared out the window. Tessa watched him for a moment. He looked deep in thought, or, not thought- but reminiscence.

"Is it hard?"

Her voice snapped him out of his mind, sounding loud in the quiet jet though it was little more than a whisper. His was it usual gruffness. "What? Is what hard?"

"Seeing Bale so early afterwards."

He shook his head and looked back out of the window. "It wouldn't matter how soon or not. I messed up, only my mess up lost seven people their lives. A few of which I was lucky enough to call friends. That's on me, not Bale, me."

"My brother practically worships you," she commented in a half-hearted attempt to change the subject.

"But you don't," he said, glancing to her. "Reid's a good kid."

She nodded. "He's my best friend."

"And you're wanting to make sure that I don't do anything that hurts him like going insane because of a case and completely disappearing off the map because of it, leaving him like your father did."

Tessa took a deliberate breath and tilted her chin up just a notch to look him in the eyes. It didn't surprise her a bit that he knew, but at the same time it shocked her to her core to hear it said aloud. "Yes," she said finally. "That's exactly what I'm looking for. I need to know that you aren't going to wake up one day and just decide that this isn't for you anymore. I need to know that you aren't going to break my brother's heart by leaving him in a way that my father's abandonment never did."

"Well I can't assure you of that," he said honestly. "Just about every case we do gives me a moment that makes me want to walk away, but the ending, the reward of catching our unsub is always more powerful. I can't promise that will always be the case."

"Then what can you promise?"

"That at the very least I will explain myself to him."

William Reid had never explained anything he did, holding to the opinion that he was the parent and therefore didn't need to explain anything. She nodded. "I'll take it."

* * *

"So far, nothing from the search."

Tessa and Gideon had just walked into the office, out of the killing damned heat.

"Well, what do we know about Walker?"

Morrison turned. "He's a quiet career criminal. Spent four years in a prison for a series of forged checks when he was in his early twenties. He's now 46. Past eighteen years, he owned a store which sold coins, maps, and historical documents. We raided the place as soon as you gave us Walker's name. Most of his inventory was fake, forgeries valued in the millions."

"But the walls had started to close in on him," Hotch said. "We talked to some of his clients, and he was in debt up to his ears and promising stuff he didn't have time to forge."

"Then," Elle continued, "Barbara Keller found out that the coins he had sold her were fake. She threatened to out him."

"And if she had, all of the forgeries would have been discovered, he would have done twenty years."

Gideon made a facial expression that screamed, really? "So he had to shut her up? He planted all those bombs just to kill one little old lady?"

"Yeah, and to throw us off, he made it look like it was much bigger than it was.."

A voice cut across, a very commanding and slightly nasally voice. "You hear me? I said stop now!"

Everyone turned around, Tessa being the closest, to see an Indian man with a sort of metallic collar on. His hands were shaking and he looked terrified and Tessa knew this was bad.

"Please," he said. "Help me."

Then he opened his jacket to show a bomb strapped to him and everyone except for the four FBI agents pulled their guns. Morrison commanded, "Everyone back- now. We need Bomb Squad in here."

"Please," the man said again and Gideon moved his hand out to calm everyone down. "It's not me."

He moved to take a step and Morrison stopped him. "Don't come any closer. Put your hands out and walk slowly back out."

"I can't. He'll kill me."

Gideon put his own hands up. "Who will?"

The man shook his head. "I don't know. He held a gun to me... put this on me. He said... you'll know who he is."

Gideon passed Tessa, seeming to absently step in front of her as if to shield her. "What does he want?"

"A helicopter. A passport. He's watching. Once he gets what he wants, he's got instructions to diffuse the bomb."

Tessa whispered, "That means he's close by."

"Take Hotch and Elle." He whispered back.

Morrison heard. "Let's get snipers around the parameter."

Gideon addressed the man again. "Okay, we understand. We're not gonna leave you."

"Please... take it off."

"Well, we need to figure out how the bomb's put together first."

A man, Tracy he was called, an unfortunate name, took a picture of the bomb and showed it to she and the others. Any tampering could set it off, he told them. Master bomb maker, he said. It could be booby trapped. Figuring out how to undo it would take too long. They only had about three hours. They had to isolate the man, and she didn't envy Gideon the job of having to tell him.

"We got a bead on Walker," Morrison told them once they had absconded to the sub-basement. Tessa nodded to Gideon and followed Hotch and Elle outside to corner and surprise Walker.

* * *

This felt wrong. Why would he let himself be found so easily? Maybe he thought he had enough leverage with the man. Maybe he was tired of the game. Maybe he wanted to found so he could negotiate like Hotch suggested. They had to get him alive. Tessa pulled her gun out as they entered the building.

"We're approaching the door now," Hotch said under his breath to Gideon over the coms.

"Copy that."

Tessa hadn't been in a situation like this yet, face to face with an unsub, until after they were caught. She'd never had to, but this was only her third case with the team. She then was beside the wall outside of the door, behind which a bomber was set up. Hotch nodded to Elle and then to Tessa and then opened the door. No one saw or heard anything and Hotch pulled out something that looked like a dental mirror and saw nothing.

"David Walker, federal agents." Nothing. "Federal agents!"

He mouthed the numbers to count down to the others and moved in with Elle and Tessa behind him and the others behind them.

David Walker was an older guy, graying hair that was almost no other color.

"Walker, freeze!"

"Okay, please, don't shoot!"

"Show yourself," Hotch ordered. "Show yourself! I'll shoot up the whole room."

Tessa knew he wouldn't.

"Ok..."

"All right, now put your hands where I can see them."

"I can't do that."

"Then I'll shoot."

"My hand's on the remote. I told you what I want. The passport, the helicopter, the flight!"

Hotch kept his voice steady. "Walker, listen to me. You're at the top of the FBI's most wanted list. I think you're smart enough to realize there's no way we're letting you go. But here's my counter offer: a chance to get out of here alive. All you have to do is give yourself up. Just slide the gun across the floor. You have until 3. 1..."

"You wouldn't let the hostage die," Walker accused.

"You want to find out? Don't give yourself up. 2..."

"Okay! Okay." There was sound of the gun sliding across the concrete floor. "I'm coming out. Don't shoot."

At that, something clicked in Tessa's mind and she frowned, tightening her grip on the gun.

"Now, walk slowly towards me. Let me see your hands, Walker."

Tessa looked over to Hotch taking a few steps. "Um, Hotch-"

She was interrupted over the coms by Gideon's voice expressing the same thing she was about to say. "Get out of there now! Now!"

Hotch turned, pushing people out. "Go! Go! Go! Go! Go!"

Tessa and the other two barely made it around the corner when the room went up in flames. "We're fine," he told Gideon. "Everybody made it out. Everybody but Walker. Is the hostage okay?"

"He's fine. For now."

* * *

The first thing Spencer did upon seeing her as he walked in with Bale was hug her. He pulled back and checked her over to be sure she wasn't hurt and she blushed, pulling him into a corner.

"I'm fine, Charlie."

"You were almost caught in a bomb."

"But I wasn't."

He sighed and kissed her forehead. "Okay. I'll leave you alone, but we're discussing this later."

"There's nothing to discuss."

"Okay," the man in the cage with the hostage said. Tracy again. Tessa watched from Gideon's side, Spencer beside her with a comforting hand on her back. "I've isolated the wires connected to the actual device. We've got one shot at this. It's either the... blue wire or the red wire."

"Which do we cut, Bale? Red or blue?"

"Red."

Tessa frowned. Gideon didn't look over to Bale. "You know if you are lying, this thing goes boom, you get nothing, right?"

"Yes."

"If we cut the red, it's over. You get to spend your time in a cushy asylum, bushes, trees, visits, nurses... and we get this man out of here alive."

"I don't see how I could be any clearer."

"Red wire, right?"

"Yes."

Gideon looked over to Tessa and she understood. He was asking her what she thought, if she was thinking the same thing he was as they were so often on the same page. She shook her head almost imperceivably as a shake and he nodded just as vaguely, bringing the handheld receiver to his mouth.

"Cut the blue."

Everyone snapped their heads to him and Gideon made eye contact with Bale as he repeated himself. Cut the blue. Three seconds to spare.

* * *

"So," Spencer said, sitting next to Tessa on the jet, reading his book while she doodled in one of her 'Charlie Notebooks'. "I like the new wardrobe."

She smirked. "Yeah? Maybe next we can work on that hair?"

"I never said I'd go that far," he chuckled. "Thank you, Beetle. Really."

"They look nice," she told him. "More like my brother and less like a challenged cousin that I don't like to associate with."

He smiled and closed his book, leaning back to get some sleep.

 _"_ _Forget regret, or life is yours to miss." -Jonathan Larson_

 **A/N: Okay, I have quite a few things for this note. Number one, for all my fellow Americans, I hope you all had a fun and safe fourth of July. I literally did nothing. My roommate and I drove around downtown to watch fireworks, but were getting there just as they were finishing. C'est la vie. Anyway, yes. I love the musical Rent. Or really any musical. That's where the second quote came from for this chapter.**

 **Morgan. Everyone commented about the kind of guy they each think Morgan is. Morgan is NOT a love em and leave em kind of guy, and this is why. He never actually is in a relationship- he just has sex with different girls. That's VERY different than having a new girlfriend every week. In all honesty, I don't have a problem with one that I do the other. I have no problems with an adult who who knows they aren't ready or interested in a real relationship and chooses to just have sex with other consenting adults. Again, very different. Yes, he will have to tell Tessa when the time comes that he is serious about her and that it's not just about sex, but personally I wouldn't have too much of an issue with one of my three sisters being with him. He's a good man and he is obviously going to be serious about them. If he WAS the type to have a different girlfriend every week then I would have issues. But I do not have the issues you all seem to with Morgan.**

 **Phew. Okay. Got that out of my system next on the agenda- I HATE Elle Greenway. I really just want to write her out of my story, but I'll wait to see what you all think. If I did that, she would not be in my next chapter. At all. I hate her, even though I don't really have an explanation I can, you know, explain. I just hate her. So, please let me just write her out.**

 **Okay, I think that's it. If not, I'll kick myself until I finish the next- OH! Okay. LDSK episode. I will NOT be taking out the scene with Hotch and Spencer because I LOVE that scene and I think it's kind of important with both characters and the relationship between them. But, I WILL be writing her reaction to finding out what's going on when she is outside and knows he's at gunpoint.**

 **Love always, Skye.**


	4. Clear

Chapter four: Clear

 _"Don't forget that I cannot see myself, that my role is limited to being the one who looks in the mirror." -Jacques Rigaut_

Tessa squeal/screamed and slammed her palms against the steering wheel of her jeep. She leaned her forehead against the wheel and sighed heavily, leaning back to pull her phone out of her purse to dial Derek.

"Hey, princess. What's up?"

"Well, I need my Prince Charming. Your damsel in distress has a flat tire."

She could hear Derek breathe through his teeth in sympathy and then laugh with the same breath. "Alright, my damsel. Where are you?"

Tessa opened her car door and stepped out. "I... actually don't know. Um, I don't know. I was heading home and got turned around. I still haven't had the time to drive around and find my way."

"What do you see? Street signs?"

"No on the street signs. I see some sort of oriental market or something. It's the only thing open."

She could hear the jingle of keys on his end. "I know right where that's at. It's late though, go hang inside until I get there."

"Okay. I cannot tell you how thankful I am, Derek. Really."

"Anything for you, princess."

She was looking at sets of chopsticks when he entered the store and saw her, causing a stupid grin to grow on his face. Tessa turned and found him looking at her and smiled back, waving him over.

"Hey, just let me get these and we can go, but I have some stuff in the backseat of my car."

"You can use those? I thought Reid was challenged in 'foraging for food with two number two pencils.'"

She chuckled. "He is, but I happen to prefer it."

When they got to the register, Derek pulled his wallet out and pulled out a few bills to hand the cashier.

"What are you doing?"

"I got it."

"Derek, no. That's insane. You're saving me by coming to pick me up. I can pay for my own stuff."

"Princess, I know you can. But you're my friend. Let me do something nice for you."

Without waiting for her answer, he handed the money to the cashier behind the counter and Tessa took her bag. Derek held the door open, following her out.

"You really didn't have to," she said. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it. What do you have in the back seat?"

She opened the car door with a creaking sound. "Charlie's new wardrobe. We left before we could finish shopping and he absolutely refuses to go out again. I even tried to trick him by saying we could go get lunch or something, but apparently I have a tell."

"You do. Your nose quivers and you flex your toes in your shoes to ground yourself."

"Okay, how do you even know that?"

"A person notices when their best friend has a quirk or a tell."

She gave him bag after bag to put in his car, following him to put everything in his trunk. He shut the trunk and walked around the car to her door, opening it for her and shutting it when she was in. Tessa wasn't sure why she called him. They were friends, of course, closer than she was to anyone else on the team besides Spencer- but she could have called Spencer. He could drive, he just preferred not to. And he was going to chew her out when he finds out that she had a flat tire and didn't call him. He'll give her statistics about mugging after dark in that area, but she didn't even think about it. It was automatic. Oh! I have a flat tire? Let me call Derek.

"You okay?"

She jumped at his voice and looked over with a smile. "Yes, I'm fine. I really cannot tell you how much I appreciate this, Derek. Really."

"I'm surprised you called me."

"You are honestly the first one I thought about when I pulled over. Charlie, however, is going to freak when he finds out. He's my brother, and very protective."

He nodded and glanced to her before moving his eyes back to the road. "I'm a big brother with two sisters and I completely understand."

Tessa shifted in the seat to face him. "I didn't know you had siblings."

"Just the two, but my family's really close. I go home every year to see them."

"That's really cool. Charlie and I have always been close, best friends in the womb. When we were four, he taught me how to read. When we were six I taught him how to ride the big bikes. He's my best friend."

"What about your parents?"

She swallowed the bile that rose to the back of her throat when he asked. "Our father left when we were ten. Mom would spend hours reading to us, her favorite being Marjorie Kemp."

"Did he ever come back?"

Tessa guiltily looked down at her shaking hands. "Once," she whispered. "Spencer doesn't know. He came back one afternoon about a year and a half later. I had just gone into high school, Charlie graduating soon, and there he was. Like he had always been."

She registered that they were at her house now, Derek angled in his chair towards her. "What happened?"

She cleared her throat and looked up at him. "I told him to leave. I told him that... we didn't need him. That he would just leave again and we were better off without him."

Derek reached over and took her hands. "You did what you thought was best for you and your family."

"Yeah," she said, faking a smile. She wasn't always sure it _was_ best. Maybe it would have helped her mom. "Come in. I'll make you a cup of coffee."

"You hate coffee."

"Yeah, but you don't. Plus, you can meet Jack."

* * *

Tessa stopped in the hallway, one hand on the wall to balance herself and the other slipping her heel on her left foot. Once upright, she smoothed out her batwinged red dress and made sure her hair was secure-moving aside the flyaways framing her face. Today was her birthday, hers and Spencer's.

She walked over to the table in the front hallway and picked up the small box with her gift for Spencer. She hoped he liked it. There was a knock at the door and Tessa walked over to open it to see both Derek and Spencer waiting. She grinned and opened the door wider to let them in, Jack running down the hall to say hello to Derek- his new favorite person. Spencer came in to hug her and stopped short at being barked at by Jack. He put his hands up in silent surrender and Derek laughed, kneeling to pet the dog.

"Happy birthday, Beetle," Spencer said, able to hug her.

"Happy birthday, Charlie. Love you."

Derek stood and handed her a smoothie from her favorite place that she hadn't realized he had. Strawberry. Her favorite. She took a sip and sighed, smacking a little. She hugged him.

"You are a life saver. This is amazing."

"Happy birthday, princess."

Spencer cleared his throat and pointed with a smirk. "Is that, uh, is that my present?"

Tessa looked down at the box in her hands and moved it behind her back. "Maybe." She held it out to him and he pulled a similar box from his pocket to hand her. She undid the ribbon around it and looked up with a smile. They always opened their gifts to each other at the same time.

"One-"

"Two-"

"Three," they both said, opening the boxes together. Tessa gasped at the Galadriel pocket watch necklace he'd gotten her. He laughed at the fact that she'd gotten him a pocket watch as well. The outside face was a compass that opened to the clock.

"You got each other the same gift?" Derek asked unbelievably.

Spencer didn't look up, but commented. "It actually happens more often than you'd think. Two years ago we both got each other the same book."

"Except the one I gave you was autographed."

"Only because you accosted the poor man."

"Just turn the damn thing over."

"You turn yours over."

Derek watched with eyebrows pulled together and a half chuckle. They'd also both had a quote engraved. Tessa read hers and smiled in hopes of keeping the tears from falling.

 _"_ _But I feel protective. I want to shield her from the evils of the world. I want to tell her it's going to be okay, even when I know that's a lie. I want to keep her safe in my arms even if it's not possible. I just want to help her. I want to be her hero."_

She sniffed as he read his aloud. "I am smiling because you are my brother. I am laughing because there's nothing you can do about it." He looked up and smiled, hugging her and kissing her forehead. "I love you, Beetle."

"I love you, Charlie."

Derek clapped his hands once and rubbed them together. "All the love, but, we're going to be late."

Tessa pulled away from Spencer and rolled her eyes, slipping the necklace over her head. It was cold against her skin, falling just at her breast. "Alright, let's get going."

She followed them out to the car and stole the front seat, having the door opened for her by Derek with the roll of Spencer's eyes- eyes that looked just hers. Like caramel. In her seat was another box, this time with a note that said her name in Derek's handwriting. Tessa looked up at him, smiling and pointed.

"What is this?"

"It's my princess's birthday. What sort of prince would I be if I didn't get my princess a crown?"

Her jaw dropped an inch. "You- a crown? You got me a..."

She opened the box and found a collectible Disney Princess crown. She looked back to Derek and smiled, holding it out for him to place upon her head.

"There," he said with that cocky smirk. "You're perfect."

"This is ridiculous." She laughed.

"No," an exasperated voice said. "You two are ridiculous. We're late."

Tessa bit her lip against a grin and got into the car. Derek shut her door and moved to make his way around.

"You're impossible," Spencer muttered under his breath after the door was shut with Derek outside.

"What are you talking about?"

"Flirting with Morgan?"

"I wasn't flirting."

"You were _so_ flirting. He isn't right for you, Elisabeth. He's a flirt and he'll only break your heart."

Tessa's heart jumped and beat faster when he said that and she looked to the side view mirror to watch Derek walking around the back of the car. "First, Spencer, I wasn't flirting. Second, you don't get a say in who is or is not right for me. And third, Derek is a good man."

"I'm not saying he's not. I'm just saying that you aren't to date him."

"Date him? I'm not going to date him."

"But you want to," he accused, his voice raising a bit higher.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Derek asked, opening the driver side door.

Tessa forced a smile. "Nothing. Just, Spencer's afraid of being late."

Derek frowned. "Spencer?"

She cursed herself for her mistake. "I do call him his name from time to time."

* * *

"The birthday twins," Garcia greeted as they approached their desks. She had a bag over her arm and stood next to JJ, holding a cake with chocolate frosting and blue lettering. Twenty four candles. Tessa was twenty four. JJ set the cake down on Spencer's desk and lit them, pulling Spencer's chair out for him. Garcia placed a tall silly birthday hat on Spencer's head. Derek rolled Tessa's chair up for her as well- the one that had originally been Spencer's.

"Alright, you two. Blow your candles out. One... two... THREE!"

Tessa chuckled and blew with Spencer, candles that came back. Spencer kept trying, but Tessa was too lost in her fit of giggles. "They're trick candles, Spence," JJ told him.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Hotch and Gideon standing a few feet away, talking. Beside Hotch, looking rather nervous and out of place, was a woman with dark hair. Garcia caught her looking.

"Apparently they already found a replacement for Elle. I haven't been able to do background on her yet." Elle had gone home to New York upon finding out that her brother's wife was pregnant, deciding she'd rather be home with family.

"Why is she all the way over there?" Derek asked.

Garcia shrugged. "Maybe we're too rowdy."

Or too nervous and awkward. Tessa stood and smoothed her dress, grabbing a plate with a piece of cake JJ had just cut and walking toward the three antisocials in the back.

"Hi, I'm Tessa."

The woman brightened just slightly. "Emily. Prentiss."

Tessa gestured with the cake on her hand for Emily to take it. The woman did so hesitantly. "I thought you'd like some cake. Would you like to come meet everyone?"

They were interrupted by the signal of a phone and Hotch's name being called. As he walked away, Spencer walked over to talk to Gideon. Tessa gestured, "Emily, this is my brother Spencer Reid. Charlie, this is Emily Prentiss."

"It's nice to meet you," Emily said with a bright smile and an outstretched hand to shake. Spencer stared at it and cleared his throat awkwardly.

"And you as well," he said.

Her smile dropped and so did her hand. "Don't worry about him," Tessa whispered encouragingly. "He's just very particular about physical contact."

Emily nodded. "Are you two twins?"

"Yes, we are."

"Happy birthday."

"Thank you."

Hotch approached them. "Sorry, guys, the party's over."

* * *

"We're going to San Diego."

"Not for the surfing, huh?" Derek laughed.

Tessa rolled her eyes and took the file from JJ to look at. "They're calling him the Tommy Killer," JJ said, setting a file down in front of everyone.

Hotch opened his own. "Six women raped and murdered in their homes in the last three weeks."

"Six in three weeks?" Emily asked incredulously.

"That's a short fuse," Gideon acknowledged.

"And getting shorter," Hotch said. "The first two were eight days apart, then the next four in two weeks."

Spencer frowned. "Rapid escalation. Do you think he's regressing to a psychopathic frenzy?"

"No," Tessa said, looking at a picture of the crime scene. "He's too controlled for that."

Hotch nodded his agreement and stood up to leave the room. "See you on the plane."

"Why the Tommy Killer?" Derek asked.

Hotch stopped and turned around. "You know the rock opera? Well, this unsub glues his victims' eyes wide open."

Tessa grimaced and turned the picture over.

* * *

"Brenda Samms was found yesterday by her children when they got home from school. She had been strangled with a thin ligature, possibly a wire."

"No weapon left at the scene," Emily commented.

"Residue on the wrists and mouth indicate that duct tape was used and then removed." Spencer read aloud from the report.

"Also not found at the scene." Hotch said.

"Brought it with him, took it with him."

Tessa looked up from her Charlie Notebook where she was doodling an eye. The unsub had begun leaving messages at the fourth scene on the mirrors. Emily began to read one aloud.

"Fair lady, throw those costly robes aside. No longer may you glory in your pride. Take leave of all your carnal, vain delight."

Tessa looked up from her doodles again as Spencer finished the line. "I've come to summon you away this night."

Tessa nodded and spoke the next verses. "What bold attempt is this? Pray let me know from whence you came, and whither I must go. Shall I, who am a lady, stoop or bow to such a pale-faced visage? Who art thou?"

"It's a ballad," Spencer explained, "from the late 1600s. A dialogue betwixt Death and a lady."

Tessa chuckled, going back to her notebook. "Betwixt," she laughed. Spencer didn't mention it was still a book they read together on rainy days over hot chocolate and coffee, that their mother used to read it to them on one of her good days, that it was one of the first things Tessa had ever learned to read.

"A 17th century ballad?" Emily questioned. Gideon smiled from his own paper. Tessa could swear he was doing the exact same thing, drawing eyes.

"Yeah, essentially, a woman begging Death to live."

"What kind of person knows this ballad? Are we looking for a literature professor?"

Derek caught Tessa's eye and winked, making Tessa blush and Spencer falter because he was too busy glaring at the two. "Anyone with an internet connection, actually. You should see what comes in when you type the word 'death' into a search engine."

"Reid, no wonder you can't get a date," Derek laughed.

Tessa frowned and straightened, catching Derek's eye and glaring at him enough to make him recoil.

"Reid, you and Tessa stay on the messages. See if there's a deeper meaning."

"Well, it definitely looks like he ransacked the crime scene pretty well." Derek, getting over the cold look from Tessa, held up a picture.

Hotch looked over to him. "A lot of damage, nothing taken."

"The eyes are the thing," Gideon said. "The signature. The behavior that isn't necessary for the murder, but necessary for the emotional release. That's what he's there for."

"There used to be a widely held belief that the eyes record a snapshot of the last thing a person sees before they die."

"Yeah, that's right. People used to write poems about talking to Death."

"Ballads," Tessa corrected.

Emily sighed. "You think they'll ever run out of new things to do to their victims?"

Gideon stared at nothing. "Well, finding new ways to hurt each other is what we're good at."

* * *

Upon entering the San Diego Police Department, they all went their separate ways without speaking, not needing to, and left making apologies to Hotch and JJ. Tessa and Spencer moved to make a board of the messages, it just so happened that Tessa had a collection of poetry that she always took everywhere with her. Really, it was just a rather large binder with works of poetry and short stories she printed out and stuck in plastic slicks. Gideon moved to the board they had of the crime scene photos and information. Derek and Emily, who looked much more confident in her element, moved to look at victimology. Spencer and Tessa bent over her binder, fingers glossing over the lines- hers only just behind his and all the while driving her insane that she couldn't read quite so fast.

"My name is Death," Tessa read aloud. "Have you not heard of me? You may as well be mute..."

"Creepy, huh?" Tessa jumped at JJ's voice.

Spencer turned just looked up briefly. "Actually, conversations between Death and his victims was a fairly popular literary and artistic theme throughout the Renaissance." JJ raised her brows at him question and he stammered. "Y-yeah, creepy."

They left the small, closet-like room to find Hotch- Tessa sure to bring her binder with her. She and Spencer started that binder together when they were younger and it was among her most prized possessions.

"It looks like what he's written are most of the first three verses of the same ballad," Spencer told Hotch, and Emily who was looking at the rapes specifically.

"Most of?" Hotch asked.

Tessa juggled her precious binder to open it and flip to the ballad, pointing at what they were talking about. "Yes. It's only one part of the conversation. There's no 'betwixt'," she chuckled. "Death speaks, but the lady never answers."

"Maybe he feels like their bodies are answer enough."

When Gideon and Derek returned from the last crime scene, whilst Emily and Hotch were still at the "almost" scene, Spencer and Tessa moved to show them what they found. Derek tried to make eye contact, but she avoided it, looking instead at the ballad in her hands to show Gideon.

"The verses," Spencer said.

"Found something?"

"Not an answer," Tessa explained, "a question. He's followed the ballad to a T, at least the Death side of the conversation."

Gideon frowned. "But?"

Tessa looked at Spencer to continue. "Why didn't he leave them at the first three murders? I mean, this ballad is ten verses long just on the Death side- he's got plenty to work with. But if it's not part of his signature, if it isn't something he _has_ to do for an emotional reason, then, I mean, why start?"

Gideon looked like he was almost going to smile as he looked up to find a familiar blonde. "JJ, find out when the press ran the first story on this unsub."

"When?"

"After which victim."

"You got it."

"What are you thinking?" Derek asked, still trying to shoot Tessa looks.

Gideon shrugged with a half smile. "Wasn't getting enough attention."

Spencer agreed. "Police departments sometime don't even realize they're looking at a pattern."

"Yeah, until somebody tells them," Derek said, brushing his hand against Tessa's to get her attention. Still, without looking at him, she moved her hand to wrap them around the binder in her arms, looking up to Spencer who was frowning slightly at her.

"The first story ran the morning after the fourth victim was found," JJ said.

"The increased patrols didn't begin until after the fourth victims either."

"Yeah, the police didn't realize what was happening, he writes his verse-"

"And everyone knows he was there."

Hotch and Emily walked up to them. "The offender in this new attempt is a black male."

Everyone frowned. "Black male? Cross racial- that doesn't happen."

"What about Herbert Mullin? He killed fourteen different people of completely varying ages, races, and creeds."

"But there was no sexual component to his crimes," Emily reminded quietly. "And he wore a ski mask. This attacker wore a ski mask."

"Tell them we're ready," Gideon said.

Derek frowned at him, the way he always did when he wasn't sure about one of his orders. "For our profile?"

No, Tessa found herself thinking bitterly. For a conga line. She'd always loved those.

"We're going to make Tommy contact us."

They moved to meet with the entirety of the police department, but Derek grasped her arm gently to stop her from moving. "What's wrong?" He asked her with a frown and something of a whine in his voice. "Did I do something?"

Tessa glared at him. "I understand you teasing my brother, but putting his intelligence down by saying, and I quote, 'no wonder you can't get a date'? That's too much. He's always had people putting him down and teasing him for how smart he is, but you shouldn't be one of them. And if you want to be anything more to me than a face I simply have to work with, you won't be."

She ripped her arm away from him and moved to find Spencer for the profile.

* * *

"The unsub brought his weapons with him," Gideon was saying to a room of bored looking people taking notes that they either wouldn't read later or not understand them. Tessa move to stand beside Spencer.

"Where did you go?" He whispered lowly.

"Just talking," she said, not an all together lie.

Spencer tutted, "You have a tell. What's wrong?"

She bit her lip and lowered her head, feeling the crown that she never took off shift and make her feel somewhat guilty for acting that way toward Derek. "Nothing, Charlie. Just- I love you and I can't tell you how thankful I am to have you for a brother."

He frowned, but didn't question her further.

"Tape, glue, wire. He did not leave them at the scene. He took them when he left. He has a kind of killing kit that he carries."

"Organized killers usually have a skilled job, likely technology related, which may involve the use of the hands. The crime scenes are far enough apart that he needs a vehicle. This will be well-kept, excessively clean, as will be his home. He's diurnal, the attacks occurred during the day, so the vehicle may be related to his work, possibly a company car or truck."

Derek glanced to Tessa as he started to speak. "We believe he watches the victims for a time, learns the rhythms of the home, knows his time frame."

"You're not going to catch him accidentally."

Gideon stood to point to a few pictures. "He destroys symbols of wealth in the victims' homes. He harbors envy of and hatred toward people of a higher social class. He feels invisible around them."

Spencer nudged Tessa to speak and she looked up. "Class is the theme of the poem," she told them, "which he left at the various crime scenes. At one point in the poem, the woman attempts to bribe Death, But he doesn't accept it. He says this is the one moment when riches mean nothing."

"When Death comes," Spencer said, "the poor and the rich are exactly alike."

"So he's poor," someone in the room asked.

"Probably middle class," Hotch contradicted. "A decidedly lower class person would stick out in a highly patrolled neighborhood. This guy appears to belong there. He blends in."

"Why does he glue the eyes open?"

Emily took over. "The unsub is an exploitative rapist. Most rape victims, during the attack, turn their heads. For some rapists, this ruins the fantasy. For this type of rapist, the goal is more related to the victim watching him than the act itself."

"The verses, the staging, the aggressive language, 'I am Death,' this is a guy who, while being in control at the crime scene, almost certainly feels inadequate in the rest of his life."

"That's why he couldn't wait for you to figure out what he'd done, why he needed to make sure all his crimes were counted. His victims, they represent whatever it is that's controlling him, and he wants that control back. He is under the thumb of a very powerful woman who frightens him. And a final point. He is white."

"We have witnesses that identify him as a black male."

Gideon nodded. "The attacker was black. He is not the Tommy Killer."

"Mrs. Gordon's husband came home at the same time that he always does. The Tommy Killer would have known that."

"And Mrs. Gordon's attacker wore a ski mask. The unsub knows when he walks into a house, he's going to kill the woman who lives there. If you're not leaving any witnesses, why wear a ski mask?"

Derek spoke again, his voice trying to send shivers down Tessa's spine, but she resisted, finding a particularly interesting piece of carpet to stare at. "And he wants the victim to see him anyway."

"Your attempted rapist is a garden variety disorganized young man."

"As the victim's age goes up, generally, the attacker's age goes down. Mrs. Gordon is about sixty, which puts her rapist at about twenty."

"And it takes years," Gideon said, "to develop the level of calm and sophistication that Tommy displays at a crime scene, and the rapist is far too young for that."

"Mrs. Gordon told em that there's a young man who delivers groceries to their home. He fits a lot of what we're describing here."

Captain Griffin stood with a bit of a huff. "Great. So we're back to zero on Tommy."

"Not at all," Hotch said. "May I see you in your office for a moment?"

* * *

They had the man who attacked Mrs. Gordon and were waiting for the unsub to call with a trap and trace set up with Garcia. Tessa found herself pacing the length of the main path between desks. Spencer pulled her aside.

"Why did Morgan just try to have a heart to heart with me?"

Her eyes widened. "He _what_?"

He nodded. "He just told me that he wanted to make sure I understood that when he teased me is was all just jest and that he admired and respected me. Not to take anything personally and to apologize for anything he might have said. Care to explain why?"

Tessa felt a grin spread across her face. "Not at all."

" _Elisabeth_."

There another ring in the room, not strange considering what they were waiting on, and then Detective Martin was waving everyone over and Spencer guided Tessa with a hand on her back. Line six.

 _"_ _You stupid, incompetent sons of bitches! I don't make mistakes! I am Death! You hear me?!_ _ **I**_ _am death! You'll see now. Tomorrow. Mark my words, you will see. And while I'm taking her, I'm gonna be thinking of you."_

And then his voice was gone. Garcia panicked over the phone about not getting a location and hung up to look into it and everyone sort of breathed a heavy sigh of tiredness. Derek glanced over at Tessa and she looked back, walking over to sit with him.

"Hey," she said softly.

"Hey," he replied back.

She looked down at her hands. "I heard that you went to talk to Charlie."

He nodded and looked up to her eyes. "You're my best friend, Tess. I really do only mean it as teasing with Reid. I didn't mean to make you so upset. Please."

She smiled. "Thank you. I'd hate to lose my best friend over something like that."

Derek gave his own lopsided smirk and kissed her forehead, getting up to find coffee.

* * *

"We have an undercover car for each of your teams, and the entire damn department out there, too."

"Remember," Gideon said, "a truck. Maybe a work truck, in excellent condition."

"Everyone knows," the Captain reassured him.

Hotch had his hands on his hips in what Tessa was trying very hard not to call his, 'let's get serious' stance. "All right, he might make a mistake today. He's angry, and he probably hasn't done the kind of surveillance he'd like."

Derek stood next to Tessa, all well again. "Yeah, well, neither have we." He placed a hand on the small of Tessa's back and nudged her, "Let's go, Tess."

"I'm coming with the two of you," Spencer said, more relaxed than she was sure he had been since she met Derek.

* * *

Tessa loved the color red. It was such an expressive color; anger, love, passion, fire, pain. So she loved the undercover car they had, even briefly entertaining the thought of buying one, but she loved her old school bus too much. The tires would be replaced and a full check up done when she returned home. Derek, beside her, was restless. He bounced his leg, he checked his watch, and huffed a few times.

"What?" Tessa asked finally, before losing her mind.

"It's 10:30 already."

"All he said was tomorrow," Spencer reminded from the backseat. "He didn't... specify morning."

Derek leaned his head against the seat belt. "Reid, this guy's gotta spend a lot of time in the house. A lot. He needs it to be morning."

"Are we sure this is a good spot?" Tessa asked, looking out the side view mirror.

"Three of the victims lived within a block of this street. It's the main artery through the neighborhood."

"True," Spencer said, "but three victims in the same block could mean he's done with the area."

"Or that he's just really familiar with it," Derek argued back. "But then on the other hand, the other victims lived more than a mile in either direction. God, I hate not having a plan. It's like we're looking for a needle in a haystack here."

"Actually," Spencer contradicted, "it's like looking for a needle in a pile of needles."

"What?"

"A needle would stand out."

Derek chuckled. "And we're not looking for someone who stands out."

Spencer raised binoculars to his face. "We're looking for a particular needle in a pile of needles."

Tessa frowned, opening her car door and stepping out. Derek called after her. "What are you doing?" But she waved him off. She heard another car door opening, two, and shutting. Then Spencer was to her first.

"How could he not have been seen?" She asked. "They've doubled the police patrols three times now and yet no one has seen him. Who sees a worker?"

"What-what do you mean worker?"

"I mean, no one thinks about Jehovah's Witnesses. Or that guy selling vacuums door to door. Or the man fixing the telephone poles."

Spencer stopped her. "The victims were all positioned looking out the window. He watched them, raped and killed them, and then made them watch him while he worked."

Derek's phone rang. Garcia. The number had been routed through twenty-five different substations. "I'm calling Gideon."

They all moved back to the car and Derek put the phone on speaker. "He does phone repairs," Tessa said.

"We just got it," Gideon said. "We're calling Garcia now to look into the records. Get back downtown- you're closer."

* * *

Derek opened and showed his badge. "FBI. I need to know where one of your technicians is."

"FBI?"

"Where are your technicians?" Spencer asked.

The man behind the counter shook his head slightly. "They're all out in the field."

Tessa moved harshly past Spencer and Derek, slapping her hand against the counter and honestly, making her hand sting a bit. "Listen, I need Franklin Graney right now."

The man's eyes widened and he nodded his head.

* * *

"You know," Derek whispered in low tones on the flight home. "Reid's lucky to have you."

Tessa smiled and looked back to where her brother was playing chess with Gideon. "No, I'm the lucky one. I don't know what I'd do without him."

"Hey, what do you say we go to dinner when we land? I'm starving. You, me, Reid, and Garcia."

There was something about the way he said 'Reid and Garcia' that made her smile. She glanced back toward her brother again. "Want to do some matchmaking?"

 _"Birds sing after a storm. Why shouldn't people feel as free to delight in whatever sunlight remains to them?" -Rose Kennedy_

 **A/N: So I felt like that conversation between Tessa and Morgan had to happen as Spencer is not the only one that's protective. I'm thinking that at one point, there will be a case in Vegas surrounding the high school they both went to and they see people they used to know. Next case will be the LDSK case. It's a favorite of mine. What did you think? Also, I have another story that I am writing, but I won't post it until a have a few chapters written ahead. It's a completely Harry Potter story in which I have no doubt that I will be receiving death threats for writing. I'm not sure how I feel about it myself. I hope you guys will like it. Oh well. It won't be up for a while. Today is my little brother and sisters' birthday and this one is for them. They're twins too. Yikes, I feel bad for my mom as they turn thirteen today. Love always, Skye.**


	5. Holding

Chapter five: Hold on

 _Shakespeare wrote, "Nothing is so common as the wish to be remarkable."_

"You can do this."

"No. I can't."

"Charlie, you just have to relax."

"Relax?"

Hotch cleared his throat from behind them and Tessa stepped aside so Hotch could direct. "On SWAT, we broke shots down into three steps. One- front sight. Focus on the front sight, not the target. Two, controlled trigger press. Focus on your breathing. Three, follow through. After the shot, you come right back to the target. Now what did you do wrong?"

"I didn't follow through."

"Right. You came off the target to see where you hit."

Spencer sighed. "My firearms qualification is tomorrow morning. I barely passed my last one."

Hotch motioned for Tessa to take a shot in example. She took Spencer's place. She had had no problem passing her qualifications and knew that that bothered Spencer. "Front sight," Hotch told her. She raised the gun and watched the tip. "Trigger press." She took the shot with the exhale of a breath. "Follow through." Tessa kept her gun up for a moment to be sure the 'person' she shot was down. "You do those things, you'll hit your target every time."

Spencer moved back to his spot and raised the gun. He hit low to the groin area. Tessa grimaced. Hotch sighed. "They're going to take away my gun," Spencer said.

"Profilers aren't required to carry," Tessa reminded him.

"And yet, Hotch carries two of them."

Tessa looked over. "Really?"

Hotch moved his leg up to remove the gun strapped to his ankle- standing up right and delivering a shot. "When I joined the BAU, Gideon said to me, 'You don't have to carry a gun to kill someone.'"

"I don't get it," Tessa and Spencer both said at the same time.

"You will," Hotch promised, clapping Spencer on the arm. "Good luck tomorrow."

After he was gone, Spencer glared at the target. Tessa chuckled and nudged him. "Hey, you just stick to me or Derek."

Then he glared at her.

* * *

He failed his qualification.

Tessa tried to cheer him up, but he wasn't having any of it. "It's not a big deal," she told him. "You can retest in two weeks and you'll get it, I promise. You're not required to carry one anyway."

"Says my little sister that passed hers with flying colors. It's embarrassing," he hissed. "Emasculating."

"Charlie, it will be okay. Everything will be okay in the end. If it's not..."

He said nothing, just glaring bitterly into space.

"Come on, Charlie. Finish the quote."

"You know I hate that saying."

"But it works. Everything will be okay in the end. If it's not okay..."

"It's not the end," he finished with much resentment.

She grinned. "That's right. Now come on."

When she and Spencer walked into the bullpen, she could tell they knew. She could tell Derek wanted to make a joke. Tessa gave him a sharp look and took a seat at her desk, opening a drawer that was widely known as her sweets drawer. She knew it was widely known because people occasionally randomly asked her, and only her, if she had any candy. So she had a major sweet tooth. So what? She pulled out her favorite strawberry hard candy that she always carried a few of everywhere and popped one in her mouth, tossing a Tootsie Roll, her second favorite, to Spencer. They were _his_ favorite.

"Okay," JJ said as she came over to them, carrying her usual stack of folders. "Franklin Park, Des Plaines, yesterday afternoon. Three victims shot at distance. It's the third such shooting in two weeks."

"A sniper?" Emily asked.

"We don't use that word," Derek said.

"Why not?"

JJ answered, "The public perception is that the FBI doesn't have an exemplary record with snipers."

"Besides, a sniper is a professional marksman. These guys aren't snipers."

"What do you call them then?"

"L.D.S.K."

Tessa almost choked on her candy, chuckling. "Catchy."

Derek tried to steal a candy off of her desk and she popped his hand while Spencer explained the acronym. "Long distance serial killers."

"How many of these guys have we caught using a profile?"

"Apparently enough to warrant an acronym," Tessa muttered.

The answer was none.

"Two weeks, three shootings, six victims, all shot in the abdomen. The first and only fatality, Henry Sachs, married, father of three, shot in a shopping center parking lot. Nine days later, Doug Miller and Kevin Parks were playing basketball at a community center. Franklin Park four days later, Jerry Middleton, Kate Murray, and Tim Reilly. Des Plaines police have found no link between any of the victims."

"Ballistics," Derek asked.

"He's using frangible rounds," Hotch told him, "which fragmented on impact, making ballistics comparisons impossible."

"The good news," JJ said, "is that all the park victims are gonna make it. The bad new is that none of them saw anything. However, one of the patients does have an intact bullet lodged in his spine."

"What's the prognosis?" Gideon asked.

"Well, there's a disagreement among surgical staff as to whether they can remove the slug without paralyzing the patient."

Derek nodded to himself. "Well, without a useful witness or solid piece of forensic evidence..."

"The profile's all we'll have."

* * *

"L.D.S.K.s are so rare," Hotch said on the jet, "we haven't been able to build a standard profile. Here's what we do know: they're always male, and they frequently have law enforcement or military experience, and they always contact the police or the media."

"To take credit or relive the experience?"

"Both," Gideon answered JJ's question. "All serial killers attempt to relive the ecstasy they get from their killings. Some use souvenirs taken from the victims, and others return to the dump site to interact with the body."

Tessa frowned. She had her legs up in her seat, hugging one knee and sort of rocking thoughtfully, savoring the last bit of her candy. "Except, this unsub isn't a serial killer. I mean, _yes,_ he killed Henry Sachs, but what if that was circumstance and not intent. He was the only one fatal."

"So what are you thinking?" Emily asked her.

She shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe we're looking at an Angel of Death, or simply someone who lacks the skill or will to take the head shot."

"We should check both options."

* * *

"Detective Calvin, Agent Morgan and Doctors Reid."

The woman frowned slightly and motioned between them. "You're both doctors? And both Reid?"

"This is my brother," Tessa explained. "Just call me Tessa. Everyone does."

"Alright. Well, thanks for coming. Follow me."

The unsub shot from the parking lot. Him wounding his victims intentionally would classify him as a sadistic killer.

"That would help us?" Calvin asked, unconvinced.

"We know a lot about sadists," Derek explained. "But most want to be close to their victims to watch them suffer."

Tessa fiddled with her necklace, lost in thought. "A powerful scope would allow him to observe it from a safe distance."

"So how do we determine is he's a sadist?"

"We spend sometime in his shoes. And let him tell us."

"This handicap parking space," Hotch said, "couldn't be further away from the office building. It also has line of sight to all three victims and the flagpole. At this range, the unsub would have to factor in wind direction and speed as he shot. To do this, he needed a spot with a wide field of fire where he could see the flag to judge how the wind would affect each shot. He came here before the shooting, decided this was his spot... and insured that it would be empty when he got back. My guess is he's shooting from his car."

"Well, that would mean he wanted to get away from here quickly, that he didn't stick around to watch the victims suffer."

"So he would not be a sadist," Spencer said.

"What would he be?"

"A very smart, very resourceful, very paranoid sociopath."

* * *

Derek's phone rang and he moved away to answer it, Tessa stood with Spencer, Hotch, and Calvin.

"We think the shooter has intimate knowledge of law enforcement procedures."

"Detective Calvin," Spencer said, "how far out of your jurisdiction was crime scene number two?"

"About a sixth of a mile, why?"

Tessa saw immediately where they where going with this and went to explain. "If he knew how difficult it is for local police departments to interact with each other, he may have intentionally crossed jurisdiction lines."

"Y'all are sayin' the shooter's a cop."

"Or used to be." Tessa supplied.

"We're saying it's a possibility. He's scouted and prepped each crime scene. He chose and elevated each position with excellent enfilade and perfect field of fire."

"That's textbook military practice," Calvin argued.

Hotch consented. "True."

Calvin nodded. "Yeah, but maybe he was in the army."

"He was probably a Marine," Derek said as he came back over form his phone call, "Ranger, or other specialized unit. Garcia says the bullet was a .223 fired from an M-4 variant of the M-16."

"All the services use an M-4." Spencer noted.

Derek continued. "It's got a shorter barrel than the M-16. It's less accurate and it's a lot harder to fire, especially at these distances. This level of skill indicates specialized training."

"If he has specialized training," Tessa thought aloud. "He knows exactly what he's doing and intended to wound them. It's deliberate. It's like he has to show us and prove how smart he is. He has something to prove."

"Well without additional crime scenes, Garcia can't get a geographical profile."

* * *

"This initial profile," JJ warned, "is _not_ ready to be given to the media. Releasing this profile prematurely can get people killed."

Hotch solemnly stepped forward as JJ moved out of the way. Tessa stood between Spencer and Derek as she usually did, closer to Spencer who was standing just beside and slightly behind her in a protective stance. "We're looking for a thirty to forty year old male veteran, driving a car large enough to shoot from, but not so large to be noticed. Like the Beltway Shooter, it's probably a sedan, customized to conceal the shooter, his weapon, and the sound of his shot. The unsub suffers from both narcissistic and paranoid personality disorders. He works out obsessively and is never without a weapon. He's completely self centered and cannot empathize with others. Incapable of admitting fault, he blames his short comings on those around him. He has no friends, and his career history has been marked by frequent job changes. He's drawn to high-stakes jobs by a need to prove his superiority to a world he perceives has undervalued him, and these shootings are the ultimate expression of that need. We believe he changes jurisdictions intentionally and strikes during the first/second shift change, indicating an intimate knowledge of law enforcement."

"You're saying he's one of us." A stern man said, oozing authority and arrogance with his square jaw, wide forehead, and G.I. Joe styled haircut.

"We're saying he once was or is now a police officer."

"Is he driving a white van too?" There was laughter and a man in front with graying hair turned to put a stop to it.

Spencer walked off to find Gideon and Tessa admittedly watched with concern. He was taking the qualifications fail hard. She moved closer to hear.

"How are you holding up?"

"Look at me. Without a gun on my belt, I look like a teacher's assistant."

Oh, Spencer. At least now he looked like a _well dressed_ teacher's assistant. Gideon looked up at him from where he was writing, standing up and crumpling the paper. "You're not worried about how you look."

"Hotch told me that when he came to the BAU, you told him he didn't need a gun to kill somebody?"

"Well, the only truly effective weapon we have is our ability to do the one thing they can't."

Gideon's eyes shifted to where she stood and he blinked at her. Spencer turned to see where he was looking and Tessa ducked behind a desk. "Which is what?"

"Empathize. They dehumanize their victims. We humanize the killers."

"You're just saying that to convince me I don't need to carry a gun."

Tessa sat with her back to the drawers of the desk and listened to them, deciding that despite any issue she thought she might have had about Gideon, they were much more alike than she had previously thought. "I don't care if you carry a gun or not. Deadliest weapon we have is a thorough and accurate profile."

"Of course _you_ believe that."

"Footpath killer, he had a shotgun to the back of my head. I'm here, he's not. Don't agree with me? You don't have to. Ask your sister, she has a good head on her shoulders."

Tessa smiled and watched Gideon's retreating figure.

They were in their positions, waiting for instructions as they laid they scene out for where the victims were. Tessa and Derek were only a few feet away from each other, but about five yards from Spencer and Emily- when Emily's phone rang and Tessa could barely hear it. She looked over, shielding her face from the sun and wondering what the problem was. Spencer and Emily were talking then and he looked over to find her.

"Kto-to rasskazal SMI nashemu profilyu. V nastoyashcheye vremya on deystvuyet kak neizvestnyy podozrevayemyy. Deystvuyte yestestvennym obrazom, poka oni ne dostignut stvola."

Tessa frowned for a second, he had a terrible accent and always had, and then understood. Derek frowned. "Was that Russian?"

"Supposed to be," Tessa snorted, then, in a quieter tone, "Someone leaked the story to the media. Media contact."

"That could be our unsub."

She nodded. "He's also _playing_ the unsub."

Realization dawned on his face and he nodded. "And they want us to be chill so we don't clue him in."

"Right."

When smoke was seen from where the unsub's car would have been, Tessa was tackled to the ground under Derek. She tried wriggling out from under him, looking and anywhere for her brother.

"He's fine," Derek told her. "He ducked behind a tree with Prentiss. Come on."

And he grabbed her arm, pulling her close behind him to a tree and putting an arm around her protectively. She could see Spencer now across a way behind another with Emily. Then there was a gunshot and Gideon's voice was heard telling everyone to get down. Derek pulled her closer to him. The man they thought could be the unsub was just killed with a head shot.

* * *

"How did McCarty end up playing the unsub?"

Tessa sighed and sat in the chair beside Spencer. "Weigart punished McCarty for mouthing off during the profile briefing by making him the unsub and sticking him in the trunk of the car all afternoon."

"Wait. Then how did the unsub find out about the reenactment?"

"Come on," Derek said, standing behind Tessa. "Cops talk. Pissed off cops talk loud- at home, at the bars, at gyms, and to anyone who'll listen."

"What do we know?"

The unsub went from wounding civilians to executing a police officer, so he's escalated. He's not staying on script. He couldn't have picked McCarty at random and he didn't take the gut shot. He meant to kill him, but why? A message. He was upset that someone else might get credit for his work.

"He feels underappreciated."

"You know," Tessa said, "he could have just killed us." Everyone's heads shot to her. "No, really. Think about it. This is about proving to us that he can keep doing this and still never get caught. That's what he wants to show us. If it wasn't- he could have taken out all of us. He has the skill, the intelligence, and had he done that and stopped killing there's a good chance he could have stayed unknown- particularly if he left town. But he didn't."

He had to have had either contact with the victims, or the media. He hadn't contacted the media. McCarty had in a misguided attempt at payback. He had contact with the victims and once again, they were back to the hero homicide angle. The best known case was hospital nurse Richard Angelo. He would inject toxins into his victims, then wait for them to crash so that he could run to the rescue and save them. He killed at least twenty five people.

"Landman was army," Derek read from the paper he pulled from the printer once they were absconded in a meeting room inside one of the hospitals, "started out in M.P. School."

There was the law enforcement.

"But he was smart, got a degree on Uncle Sam, and ended up a doctor with special forces and bounced around from hospital to hospital since his discharge in 2001."

"Has Dr. Landman been under any usual strain? Has he had a reprimand? Has he had any kind of major blows to his ego?"

"Last month he was passed over for Chief of Surgery."

Gideon nodded. That could be enough. "Let's get a warrant for his house. Let's see if we find the weapon."

Derek stood to leave, nodding to Gideon and nudging Tessa for her to come along. She stood with him and laid a hand on Spencer's shoulder on the way out with a silent message, be safe.

* * *

"No," she laughed in the passenger seat on the ride back to the hospital, "Tell me you weren't."

"Really, I was five foot three and barely weighed a buck twenty soaking wet. I got my ass kicked everyday. I hit the weights that summer and luckily grew six inches."

Tessa grinned at the image. "I, uh, I had a friend. _One_ friend. She and I would study together. Charlie and I both got teased, him more so. In our junior year, Garrett Zane asked me out to dinner and a movie. He was on the football team and while I was never into sports, I played the tuba in the marching band and he had the bluest eyes you would ever see. I wasn't as ahead of my peers as Charlie was. Only two or three years, not six. I was fourteen, he was seventeen. It was a nice dinner, but everyone teased me because everyone remembered Charlie. Garrett's older brother had been one of his chief tormentors. He told me that I was pretty enough that I could have been popular if not for my freaky brother."

"What did you say?"

"I, uh, didn't. But he was much more ruggedly handsome after with his broken nose and Charlie felt like a hero having to some get me. I rode on the handlebars all the way home."

When they pulled up to the hospital, SWAT was outside and there were police cars with their lights on. Officers were holding back a crowd. Tessa frowned, her heart beating twice a minute. Something was wrong. Something was wrong with Spencer. Charlie. Her big brother. She and Derek got out of the car and went up to the barricade to be stopped by one of the officers. They pulled out their badges, holding them up for a minute and walking on past. They were directed to just outside of the E.R. double doors where Gideon, JJ, Emily, and Sergeant Weigart stood talking. Gideon saw them first and came towards them with raised hands to calm them down before he spoke.

"Where's Charlie?" She asked. He and Hotch weren't there. Gideon dropped his hands in defeat and gave her an apologetic look. Everyone else looked away. "Where's Hotch and Charlie?"

She caught Weigart glance at the double doors where through the window she could see the lights were out. Along the way from the car, she and Derek had caught bits and pieces. Hostage situation. Tessa felt like all of the air left her and she went to go to the doors when two strong arms wrapped around her to stop her. No. "No," she whispered desperately. Then louder. "No. No. NO!"

She tried to shrug Derek off, fighting him, but he only held on tighter. A few men moved forward to restrain her, but Gideon held a hand up to keep them back and Tessa held on to Derek's arms equally as he did her and cried. She knew she couldn't go in there. It would only increase the chances of people getting hurt that wasn't the unsub. Phillip Dowd.

He joined the army at eighteen, went to ranger school, did six years before being dishonorably discharged for conduct unbecoming. He lied about it and went on to becoming a cop. They had been right. From there, he was kicked to the curb after they found out he lied about the discharge and he got his nursing license. Tessa thought, sitting half on Derek's lap in a waiting room, that knowing more about the man would make her feel better-or, at least calm her down. But it didn't.

Derek was being wonderful. Even zoned out as she was, she could see that. He was rubbing her back and at one point, she could swear he kissed the side of her head- making soothing sounds that at any other time would make her feel embarrassed as they sounded fit for a distressed child. But she _was_ distressed. At one point, Gideon pulled Weigart aside. Tessa knew he was asking him to hold off on going in. Give our men time. They can end this peacefully. He came away from it, looking disgruntled a bit for Gideon, but he had bought them some time.

Then three minutes later, as SWAT prepared to enter, there was a single gunshot. Hotch opened the door, Dowd was dead, and the first thing Tessa did once the restraints were cut from binding Spencer's wrists, was run to him and hold on. Hold on.

 _Nietzsche wrote, "The irrationality of a thing is not an argument against its existence, rather, a condition of it."_

 **A/N: SUNBURN! FREAKING SUNBURN! *Clears throat* Right. So. In case you didn't hear... I have ridiculous sunburn on my face. Luckily, my bathing suit top was being stupid and I needed a strap for my one piece so I was wearing a t shirt. Only my face was burnt, but it is pretty bad. Last year, same day, same occasion, same lake, same SPOT, I got burnt on my chest and it actually scarred. I think I'm done going to this lake. My freaking LIPS got sunburnt. I didn't even think that was possible! But.. yeah. It was apparently. Also, literally every time I go to a lake or something I always get burned on the bottoms of my feet because I hate shoes. Anyway...**

 **Rant over. Stupid sun. Okay, I hope you liked the chapter. I am in the makings of two other stories. Maybe three, I had an idea earlier that I doubt I will be writing anytime soon. One is Harry Potter, the other is Criminal Minds. I am a bit of a snob about my writing. I admit that. But I am terrified that all my stories and characters sound like the same person. They all have a few shared traits, such as writing on themselves and sitting on tables, simply because that's what I do. Drives my husband nuts that I write on myself in sharpie that generally bleeds onto my face later. I also have an insane habit of sitting on places I shouldn't. Like tables, counters, refrigerators (long story but there's a video), and I even have a habit of doing my typing while sitting on the arm of my couch criss cross applesauce like I am right now.**

 **I try to make each character a bit different and my stories as well. Let me know if you have any comments or suggestions about that. Also, I incorporate things in my stories that I particularly like. I love kids and at some point want to own and run my own daycare, therefore there are kids in a lot of my story. One of the two I am writing currently, the criminal minds one, the main character will have a daughter. I love animals, though highly allergic to cats, and have two amazing dogs of my own. Therefore, I put animals in my stories. My dad was a major dick before he died, so when the time comes that is how I will write Tessa and Spencer's father. He died just over a year ago and I'm still not sure how I feel about it.**

 **Anyway, again. Let me know about this chapter. The next chapter... I am between wanting to do that train mission and putting Tessa there instead of Elle, or a school reunion for the high school Tessa and Spencer went to where there is a murder or something. Let me know! Love always, Skye.**


	6. Bonds

Chapter six: Bonds

 _"_ _The question that sometimes drives me hazy- am I or the others crazy?" -Albert Einstein_

Tessa collapsed onto the couch with a heavy, whiny, exasperated sigh and a heavy pout. Spencer didn't act any different, just reading his book at his normal speed and very blatantly ignoring her. She sighed again, this time heavier and more dramatic. He was now straining not to look at her as she stood on his overly plush couch and began jumping. He finally slammed his book shut with a deep sound and tossed it onto the footstool with a glare.

"I'm not going to Dallas."

She let herself fall on her back on the couch. "But, Charlie! Why not?"

"Because I'm busy."

"Going to a lecture on the evolution of mathematics is not busy, it's boring."

"And _giving_ a lecture on the evolution of psychology is any less boring?"

Tessa swung her legs around to look at him. He didn't actually find that boring, he was just more interested in his own subjects. Besides, technically Hotch was sending her to do a custodial. Not a lecture. Spencer knew this, he knew everything, but he said it in this flippant way the way he used to mispronounce words just to frustrate her. Tessa still maintained that his accents wouldn't be so bad if he wasn't trying to annoy her. She also had plans to attend a theology lecture while in the area. That was her true passion. Though, she wasn't allowed to argue religion in churches anymore after what happened the last time. She still felt a little guilty, but in her defense, he started it.

"Charlie, please. It could be fun. We never spend time together anymore outside of the job."

"Beetle, we can go to a lecture or something together when you get back, but you know how I feel about this professor's work. Plus, I hate trains."

She did. He was Spencer's hero from the time Spencer could think to have a hero. And he really, REALLY hated trains, despite loving them like any other boy as a child. Tessa rolled her eyes. "Fine. But we're getting pizza when I get back and watching really bad procedurals."

He grimaced, finding both to be somewhat torturous, but agreed as he knew how seriously Tessa took her pizza. She had a tattoo on her shoulder that said 'pizza is life'. She was lucky their mom didn't know about it. "Only if afterwards we can get Chinese and watch that new documentary about Maori tribes."

"Okay, but you have to use chopsticks."

* * *

Tessa liked trains. She found them soothing as she looked over the files for William Devries. There weren't many people on the train with her, which only made it feel cozier in some strange way as she crossed her legs and fixed her dress with the files and such on her leg.

"Remember," Gideon said over the phone, "he can't lie to you-"

"If I know the crime better than he does." She finished. She and Gideon had gotten closer too, which bothered her. If he left the team, she wasn't sure which of the two- she or Spencer- would be hurt the most. "Yes. I remember, dad."

That just came out. There was a pause and neither of them said anything for a moment and her eyes stung. He cleared his throat and spoke in a softer tone, softer than she had heard him use to anyone other than a child. It was... soothing. Like the train. "Good. Check in when you're done."

"Wait-"

"Elisabeth, I'm swamped. I'm in the middle of two consults. NSA wants a threat assessment on a terrorist cell in Hamburg by 6:00." It started cutting out towards the end and she put a finger to her ear in a vain attempt at hearing better. "Elisabeth, I don't have time right now. Can we talk when you get back?"

"Yeah. Okay. Tomorrow." The line went dead and Tessa smiled. He hadn't said anything about her slip up that she wished, if only to herself, and if only in her secret heart, that it didn't have to be just a slip up. But that was ridiculous. He was one of the only ones that called her Elisabeth. Hotch called her that from time to time, usually on the job, but Gideon called her that in a way that was sweet. Like she wished William Reid would have.

Suddenly, the brakes squealed and Tessa was thrown against the back of the seat in front of her with a groan and no doubt a future knot on her head. She picked herself back up and into her seat as a man, only younger than herself by perhaps a few years, stood up. "What the hell was that?"

The door opened and the guard came through behind Tessa. "Everything's alright, folks. Everybody just relax. Everything's gonna be fine. Everything's fine."

"What happened?" Tessa asked him as he passed her.

"Nothing, ma'am." He saw her file in her lap and crouched beside her. "You on the job?"

"FBI," she told him, not thinking much about it.

He sighed. "Suicide," he confided. "Somebody jumped in front of the train."

That was awful. "Is there anything I can do?"

"Unfortunately, we have this procedure down fairly well." He stood up again and went to finish calming everyone in the car. "Everybody just relax. Everything's gonna be fine. Gonna be underway again shortly."

Then a man, someone she hadn't really noticed, took the gun from his hip in a quick movement and shot at the guard twice, blindly hitting him both times somewhere around the abdomen.

"Oh, my god!" A woman screamed.

Tessa immediately stood, but felt her head whip to the side before she saw the man move as he struck her hard and she fell back to her seat. He pulled her gun away from her too, waving it around wildly. "Nobody move!" He bellowed.

"Okay," she told him. "Okay. You don't have to hurt anybody else."

"What are you doing?" A woman asked. She seemed to know him and Tessa had seen them talking before.

He waved the guns more, jerking them harshly in some sort of desperation. "Shut up! Shut up!"

Bugger.

* * *

"Okay," JJ said, standing and waiting for everyone to come in and sit down before starting. Spencer walked in, having been called away from his lecture in a bit of irony. "This is from one of the security cameras inside the train."

Train? Spencer frowned and sat down, a sentence echoing in his mind. _Plus, I hate trains._ "Five hostages in a car stopped on the tracks," JJ continued. "We have one security guard dead from initial gunfire."

"Is this going on right now?" Spencer found himself asking as he stood up and walked towards the screen to get a better look.

"Yeah," Emily Prentiss said, "in west Texas."

"Why are they asking for us?" Morgan asked.

Hotch answered. "Because of a particular psychological aspect of the hostage taker, which we're especially equipped to handle."

"Can you back the picture up a few frames?" He stepped forward again. "Tardive Dyskinesia"

"Once more for the rest of us without an encyclopedic memory?"

Spencer looked back at Morgan. "Sever facial tics- the kind that develop after years of taking antipsychotic medication."

"So this guy's a psychotic?"

"A psychotic with hostages."

"And two guns."

"Hostage situation on a train?" Gideon asked, walking in. Spencer found himself standing up straighter as though he were a drill sergeant.

"Yeah. In Texas."

Spencer frowned at that thought. What were the odds? For all he knew, she decided not to take the train after all. Then he heard Gideon mutter, "A train in Texas? My God."

Apparently he saw something in the clip Spencer missed. "What?" Morgan asked.

"Elisabeth."

Spencer's head jerked. Tessa. "Elisabeth?"

Sure enough she was there, sitting with her back to the camera and turned half around to keep eyes on the unsub- a worried expression on her face. Gideon paced, uncharacteristically twitchy. "I was just talking to her."

Spencer kept hearing those words again. _Plus, I hate trains,_

* * *

"Local authorities have the train surrounded," JJ said in the car as Hotch drove and JJ, Gideon, and Spencer found themselves crammed into the backseat. "Bureau hostage team snipers are in position, but they're hesitant to take action until negotiation is exhausted. The feed from the train's two cameras are being routed through to monitors on a mobile command center that the local bureau brought in."

"We need to know who on that train is gonna be a help and who's gonna be a problem," Hotch said. Spencer felt like he couldn't breathe. He had to get her out of there.

"Let's get our girl," Morgan said in a hard voice and whose words made Spencer, who would never think of himself as a violent man, want to punch him. His sister. "Let me get Garcia to work some magic on those video feeds."

Spencer liked Penelope. Garcia, he should say. She was beautiful, bubbly, and didn't make him feel like a mutant when he talked. "Garcia?... Okay, listen to me. No playing. We're gonna be feeding you some security camera video from a hostage situation over a secure line. Can you work your face recognition software over it and tell me who's who?... Penelope, Tessa is one of the hostages."

Spencer noticed the man's voice broke on his sister's name and suddenly felt conflicted, but ignored it. He had to get her safe. "Have we had any contact inside the train yet?"

"No. It took two hours to convince him to allow a two-way phone, but he won't speak to anyone except what he call the higher authorities."

"God?" Hotch questioned.

"No mention of religion thus far."

"Has crisis negotiation's lead claimed to be the higher authority?"

"The unsub won't speak to him any longer. He gave a deadline of three hours to produce this authority."

Spencer swallowed his anxiety. "When was that?"

Emily cleared her throat. "Two and a half hours ago."

Derek Morgan was shaking. Tessa was in that train with a psychotic unsub who had two guns and had already killed someone. Tessa. "This could be a delusion where he thinks the government did something to him or that they're always watching. Beetle loves movies like that where the whole world is one big conspiracy."

Derek mindlessly ran his finger over his bottom lip. There were things he found out about Tessa everyday. Things that made him like her even more. Or, maybe like wasn't the word.

* * *

Tessa pulled against the handcuffs, holding her wrist to her seat as she looked around. The guard was dead, the one she had talked to that seemed so nice. Everyone was understandably scared The man with the gun, she'd yet to learn his name, was waiting for something. Then she heard the familiar sirens of a government vehicle and perked up a bit as the unsub did.

"Teddy, you have to listen to me." Teddy, that was his name.

"No!" He said, standing up and turning to face all of them with the gun being very prominent. Everyone cowered and he stuttered, "You have to listen to me now."

A younger man, the first to stand and question when the train stopped, addressed her. "Ooh, lady, your boyfriend is whacked out of his mind."

"He's not my boyfriend," the woman said softly.

"Then who is he?" This was the man that looked absolutely terrified, holding his briefcase close to him and shaking.

"He's a psych patient, right?" Tessa asked her, watching the man look out the window, but hiding behind a seat.

The woman glanced over her shoulder to Tessa. "Yes," she said. "It's going to be okay."

"And you know that how?" The man with the briefcase asked bitterly.

Tessa looked back to the woman. "You're his doctor?" She had been taking him to Dallas to speak at a conference, as an example of the progress being made to relieve severe psychosis.

"He's an example of progress?" The younger black man asked with a disbelieving look.

"What do we do to calm him?" Tessa asked.

"He's never had this sort of break from reality, never been violent."

Tessa reiterated, "What can we do?"

"Make him feel less threatened."

"We're a threat to him? He's got two guns." Tessa glared at him when a girl who had been silent from her spot in front of the doctor groaned. She had short hair, and seemed very nervous.

"You alright?"

She rocked a bit. "No, I... oh, I think I'm gonna be sick." And then she was and Tessa ignored the complaints of the younger guy. She had been silent, she had seemed incredibly nervous, she was sick, she seemed... different. Was she pregnant? That could pose an issue considering their current position.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah. Ugh!" She sniffed a few times and sat back again. "I just haven't been feeling that well lately. My stomach."

Pregnant. Shit. Apparently the doctor was thinking the same thing. "You're not pregnant?"

At whatever the woman's answer was, the doctor stood very carefully to address Teddy- a ridiculous name. "Teddy... please. This girl is sick."

"Shut up! Sit down."

She put her hands up and slowly backed to her seat again. The man with the briefcase jingled with it, ignoring the younger man's question of what he was doing. Tessa watched with dread, knowing this was about to get bad. "Don't be stupid," she said, but something in his face changed and he pulled out a Bible.

"Why are they just sitting there?" Teddy whispered to himself. Tessa could answer, if it was her team, which if they knew she was here she had no doubt it would be, they were sitting there in hopes of making themselves look more important. The higher authorities he requested. "Come on!" he shouted, making the pregnant girl jump and the briefcase man to hold the Bible closer and the younger man to take a swig of his drink and complain with some comment.

* * *

They counted down to step out of the car, but Spencer just wanted to rush out and run to the train to get her. That would actually increase the chances of someone getting hurt though. He couldn't risk that someone being Elisabeth.

"Don't look at the train," Gideon told them. "Ignore it. The higher authority isn't concerned about losing a few civilians."

A few civilians? Tessa was just part of a few civilians? Derek's vein in his neck pulsed and he thought about just going around to the other side of the train, sneaking up on the bastard. From the looks, Reid was thinking the same thing.

"I'll talk to the H.R.T. Commander."

"I'm Frank Moretti, Dallas Field Office." The man had such a mustache that would amuse Tessa, if she were out here with them instead of at gunpoint with a psychotic. "Near as we can tell, your agent is still all right."

She'd better be, three minds thought at the same time. Jason Gideon shook the man's hand tighter than he supposed he needed to. "Has the subject asked for anything, made any demands?"

"Not beyond wanting to talk to a higher authority. How do we negotiate with a psychotic who won't talk to us?"

"That depends on the level of his particular delusion," came Jason's automatic reply, but he was thinking about that phone call with Elisabeth.

Spencer stepped forward, after vainly trying to find his sister's face in the extreme glare on the windows. "Some psychotics believe they're being sent messages by the government, God, even aliens. John Nash, he believed he was being recruited by aliens to save the world."

"I saw the movie," Moretti said, probably trying to impress them.

Spencer shook his head slowly, remembering watching the movie with Tessa. "Actually, the movie is rather inaccurate in its portrayal of-"

Derek wanted to strangle him when he went to spout off some inane fact. He understood that at the moment it was probably helping to keep his mind focused, but it was going to drive Derek mad. He laid a hand on his shoulder. "Okay, doc, doc, doc, a movie review is not gonna help Tessa right now."

They moved to the tent and truck set up for them and only then did Jason allow himself to look back at the train for the first time. They'd get her out of there.

* * *

His walking back and forth down the aisle and mumbling to himself was making her more nervous than him just staring out of the window. Then, she could have grinned when through the window she saw Hotch walking with someone, presumably local police. She had to find some way to help them, first key of which was to figure out his psychosis. He came back down the aisle to the doctor.

"Ted, you have to try and concentrate," the woman told him.

"Get up!" He said.

Then he grabbed the pregnant woman. "Take me," Tessa said over the screams. "Take me! No, take me." She stared him down and he stopped.

"You think I'm gonna let to you send them messages?"

"They're gonna want to talk to me. I can get you whatever it is you want. Take me!"

The younger man stood. "Hey, man." And Ted knocked him back with the gun before pointing it to the man with the briefcase.

"You too?"

"No. I didn't do anything!"

"Ted," the doctor tried again. "You're not in any danger here, you have to believe me!"

He continued to drag the pregnant woman away from them by her hair. He pulled her over to the two way phone, letting go and pressing the muzzle of the gun to her head. "Don't say a single word unless I say it. Deviate a single word, and I will kill you. Don't try to send them any secret messages or codes. Do you understand?"

"Codes?" The woman asked. Ah! This actually wasn't that uncommon a delusion as far as psychotics went.

"Do you understand?!"

"Yes, yes. All right, all right."

Tessa tried to pull away from the seat, only succeeding in chafing her wrist more from the handcuffs. After this, she told herself, I'm learning how to pick the lock and buying bobby pins. The woman picked up the phone and held it to her ear.

"He wants to know who you are," she sobbed. "He wants to know who just arrived." There was a moment of silence as whoever was on the line, probably Gideon, spoke. "He says it's someone who can resolve the situation." Ted pulled her to whisper the next thing in her ear. "What part of the government do you work for?"

Then, nothing. She went to repeat the question when Ted lowered the gun to her stomach and Tessa pulled hard against the seat again. "Don't hurt her!" She tried to wrench the cuffs off, maybe break them. Which was preposterous.

"Ask who they work for. No, no, ask if they're NSA. No, ask-" He was getting flustered, tripping over his words. This could either be good, where he made a mistake, or this could be bad where he became erratic and devolved. "They're FBI, aren't they?" He whispered.

"Are you FBI?" She asked. Then she lifted the phone towards him, "He says you can ask him yourself."

Ted angrily banged his fists against the seat and took the phone, "Tell me who you are, or this agent dies!... if you're the higher authority then you can have it removed... I want it removed now... No! Wait. Okay! All right. One hour. You have one hour to remove it, or I swear to God, I'll kill every agent on this train."

Then he hung up. Tessa sighed and relaxed a bit with his gun removed from the girl. Okay. She had to think like Spencer. He kept talking to himself. Maybe this feeling of the government watching or whatever was stemmed from his past. That's what determined ones psychosis, past experience. Maybe now he was delusional in seeing someone. Someone who was creating this part of Ted that he hurt people.

"Do any of you have a cell phone with service?" She asked.

"We're in the middle of nowhere," the younger man said while the doctor bandaged his head. "Welcome to Texas."

"You're bleeding more than you should be from a cut this small."

Tessa looked down at the bottle in his hands. "Head wounds always bleed worse, not to mention alcohol acts as a blood thinner. The agents outside need to know what it is that he wants removed."

The woman sighed. "He thinks the government is watching him, monitoring him."

"They monitor all of us," the bleeding man said. "They have ways of finding out everything you do."

"Don't be stupid," Briefcase Man said.

"There's an FBI agent on board. You think that's a coincidence?"

There was an outburst from their captor before Tessa could tell him to shut his trap and Briefcase Man shook. "He's going to kill us, isn't he?"

"No," the doctor said.

"He killed that security guard."

"The security guard had a gun. He felt threatened by him."

Ted groaned, "It's so hot!"

And before they could stop him, the bleeding man stood up and turned around. "You took hostages in the middle of Texas. Of course it's hot." As much as Tessa agreed with him, this wasn't helping as the man came down the aisle.

The doctor stood in front of the man. "No! That's exactly what they want, Ted. They want to divert you from having it removed." She gently reached for Ted's arm and moved it around and Tessa could see scars. "You're close to having it removed."

* * *

"His arm," Jason said, nibbling on the tip of his glasses. They'd been trying to figure out what he wanted. Giving Garcia time to dig more up. "Look at his arm."

"What is that?" Spencer asked.

"They look like scars."

"The places he tried to dig it out with a razor or a pen." Jason watched Elisabeth try to watch what was going on, while at the same time mindlessly pulling at her restraints. At this rate, she'd definitely have scars.

Moretti looked over to them. "Dig what out?"

"Maybe a microchip?" Hotch suggested.

"Oh, man. It's almost as common a delusion as claiming to be the new messiah. Ralph Tortorici held an entire classroom hostage because he believed microchips had been implanted in his body."

Derek frowned. "Wait a second, this guy believes he has some kind of device stuck in his arm?"

That sounded insane, but Reid said it and Derek hadn't known him to be wrong before. And, he was probably the only one more motivated than he was- if that was even possible. Derek tilted his head to the side at Tessa face on the screen. Half of her long brown hair was pulled back in a braid with a few strands framing her face, one of which was driving him mad by being _in_ her face. Why hadn't he noticed how pretty she is? Or maybe he had. She looked like a princess.

"Probably," Jason said absentmindedly, "and if we don't take it out, he's gonna kill somebody."

His team was his family, he'd always said that. That was part of why he and his son had the problems they had. But, he especially thought of the Reid twins as his own. More Elisabeth than Spencer, which made him feel somewhat guilty, but he still considered them both his. Then she called him Dad. It had been joking, and psychologically he supposed he could profile that she was looking for a replacement for her biological father, but how long had it been since Stephen called him 'Dad'?

"Tell me about the hostages," Jason said as Morgan came back to sit at a computer. He rolled his chair over to him.

"Okay. Let's see. First we've got Harry Anderson. He's a paper good salesman. Lived in a small home just outside of Dallas for eighteen years with his wife. He's got no children. No investments, no company retirement portfolio."

He doesn't take chances, why was he going to Dallas? "What about the kid?"

"Kid's name- Josh Patel. He's twenty years old. He just got expelled from Gillett University for driving his car into the library building drunk."

He's drinking now, and they didn't need a drunk in there. He was already causing problems from what they saw on the screen.

"Okay. The girl- we don't have a lot to go on. Nothing more than her driver's license. Her name's Elaine Curtis. She lives in a small town in west Texas. She's got no credit cards, no passport. Doesn't look like she travels much at all. This is Dr. Linda Deaton. She's a psychiatrist at Stokes Mental Health Center in El Paso. That's where Ted Bryar's been living for the last nine years."

"His doctor?" Jason asked.

"I say probably. She's unmarried, lives in El Paso. She's written several books and papers, mainly published in medical circles. She's a popular lecturer. She's scheduled to speak at several symposiums this year and tonight in Dallas. That's it. That's all I got. Garcia's in the process of looking deeper, but I don't really see how this lineup's gonna be much of a help to us, Gideon."

"Well, let's just hope none of them makes the situation worse."

* * *

Tessa looked around for a camera. There had to be one.

"Hey," Briefcase Man said. "Why aren't they helping us?"

"We're gonna get through this just fine."

"We?" The young asked. "He isn't pissed at us. You're the government agent."

The doctor whispered back for Tessa. "He probably thinks we're all agents. He believes almost everyone is."

Tessa found one and she almost smiled. Okay. She couldn't sign very well one handed. But, maybe... he could read lips okay, but, that was too vague. _He is talkative to himself. Someone named Leo._ She signed this a few times and hoped that Spencer understood it as the younger man stood up.

"I'm not with any government agent. I'm with you. Big Brother, right? Newthink? Newspeak? Hate is love. War is peace."

Ted looked to the seat across from him where she supposed his imaginary friend was and stood up, pointing the gun. "Stop it!"

The doctor stood up too, in hopes of calming him down again. "Ted, no. It's okay. He doesn't mean anything."

"Yeah, chill. I support you. Screw the government."

There was a moment and Ted motioned softly with the gun. "Make him sit down."

And then he sat down himself.

* * *

"She's signing!" Jason said, making everyone's eyes snap back to the screen. That's his girl. He looked back to Spencer. "Can you tell what she's saying?"

"I-I think so. She's using British sign."

"Sign language isn't just sign language?" Morgan asked.

Spencer shook his head. "No, in fact, the sign for hearing person in BSL is the same as deaf in ASL. She, okay. She says he's talking to himself. Like he's talking to someone else. Leo, she says his name is Leo."

Morgan stepped away to call Garcia when there was a bit of a panic or something on the train with that Josh Patel. He had to cause trouble. When Morgan came back, he told them she was looking. But they were running out of time.

"How do we remove a microchip that's not there?" Hotch asked.

"His speech is lucid," Spencer said. "There's no sign of neologisms, word salad, or loosening of associations. As long as he can systemize, he'll be able to keep his thinking relatively organized."

Morgan threw his arm in the arm a bit. "Organized enough to see through any game we try to throw at him?"

Hotch said, "And if he's convinced it's in his arm and not in a place like his lower back or his neck..."

"The incision means he's gonna be watching," Gideon finished.

"Maybe we can just convince him that he's been looking in the wrong place," Derek suggested. Tessa was brilliant, signing to Reid like that. He'd have to get her to teach him, so he could be there for her if she needed someone again.

"Or we could fake it," Spencer said, thinking back to a random conversation he'd had with Tessa years before. He'd been teased, trying to do a magic trick and gotten beaten up for getting it wrong. He tried to throw all of his magic tricks away, when she stopped him. She encouraged him to keep trying. She told him, you never know when it could save a life. He'd laughed.

Everyone looked to him. "Conceal a chip in the palm, a little, uh, sleight of hand." He showed them with the coin he'd been fidgeting with.

"Come on, Reid, what are you talking about? A magic trick?"

"Yeah, I'm talking about a magic trick."

"No," came Hotch's immediate response. Emily nodded in agreement.

But Jason was thinking. If it worked, it could be just as genius as the power twins. No one would ever suspect and the shock the other hostages would have could play into their favor. It could help them get them out of there quicker and safely.

"I used to do it during college exams. I can make it appear, I can make it disappear."

"We can't risk giving him another agent as a hostage."

Spencer couldn't believe what he was hearing. "That's my sister in there. We have to do something."

Derek agreed, standing up. "Alright, Reid. Let's go. Teach it to me."

He frowned, looking down at the coin. "What? No."

"Look, if you can do it, I can do it. Show it to me."

"I've been practicing this my whole life. We have less than thirty minutes."

Derek gritted his teeth. "Reid. I am not about to let you get on that train with an armed psychotic. And, you're too close to the situation. More so than the rest of us, she's your sister."

Spencer got closer to get in his face almost. "And you're not too close? You're half in love with her already. I'm going."

Gideon stood up and nudged them away from each other. "Reid's going. He has a point that he has been doing this for a long time. And, we're _all_ too close to this."

* * *

"What we need is a strategy," Tessa whispered, more to herself than anyone else.

"I'll try to talk to him," the doctor, who had introduced herself as Linda, said.

Tessa shook her head against where it rested on the back of the seat. "Do you think that wise?

Without answering, she started slowly down the aisle. "Ted?" she asked in a soft, rough with fear, voice. "You feel a little bit better now? You're in no danger here. These people don't want to hurt you. The FBI agent just happened to be on the train today. She has a name, a family, just like everyone else here. Let them go, Ted. I'll stay with you. You and I will do this together, only you need to let these people go. I will wait with you. No one wants to hurt you. We don't want to hurt you."

Tessa thought that Linda was actually doing amazingly well, when Ted stood up with a shout, aiming the gun. "No!"

She put her hands up in surrender. "It's okay, Ted."

"Don't!" Tessa said, pulling harder at her wrist where she could feel blood. "Or I'll make sure they _never_ take it out of you. If you hurt one more person on this train, I swear to God, I'll make them leave it in you forever."

Then the phone rang.

Ted turned and went to pick it up. "What?... I want it out... No! One. One technician... One technician! Or every agent on this train dies!... Not anymore. I want it out now. Right now! Now!"

And then he hung up and Tessa wished she could have heard the other side of the conversation.

* * *

"Reid, do not take this vest off," Derek told him. He couldn't let anything happen to Tessa's brother, as Reid had come to be known in his mind. Something about the way he yelled at Derek earlier bothered him. You're half in love with her already. "In hostage situation, SWAT sometimes won't even tell the negotiator when they're deciding to go in. Do you know why that is?"

Of course he did. "'Cause the slightest change in tone of voice or choice of words can give the whole thing away."

Derek patted his shoulder. "Don't make eye contact with Tessa. You're a technician. You've never seen her before. That's very important."

"Got it."

"Now remember, play into the guy's fantasy. Believe it yourself."

"Actually, did you know that dentists and surgeons have been recruited to secretly implant these during otherwise normal medical procedures? This has been happening off and on since the late 1930s." Derek just blinked and Spencer gave a bit of a huffing laugh. "You told me to believe."

He chuckled. "Let's go."

"Alright," Hotch said, coming back inside the van. "One government issue microchip."

Outside, Spencer tried to practice, but it was so much smaller than he was used to. Morgan told him to calm down, but he was going to pretend to pull this out of the man's arm and if he failed, he, his sister, and the hostages would die.

"I'm pulling the plug on this," Jason said, watching the man he considered to be like a second son miss the trick again.

"No, no, hold on. One more." He blew off the dirt and tried it again. Success.

"Take his chip out. Then get off the train. You understand?" Gideon asked. "Tell him to need to get back to higher authority. Say you have guidelines to follow, whatever. Do not stay in there with him. That's an order."

"Yes, sir." He moved to walk to the train and stopped. "Could you guys do me a favor?"

"Anything," Hotch said immediately.

"Could at least one of you act like you're going to see us again?"

Everyone looked to him. "See you when you get back," Hotch said in his stern voice.

Yeah, Derek thought, you'll want to kill me for asking your sister on a date.

* * *

Tessa jerked when Ted grabbed the pregnant woman by the hair and pulled her up again with the gun to her as the door opened and Tessa turned around to see who it was, her eyes widening. Charlie, you're so stupid.

"That's far enough."

He stopped walking, his arms up to show no weapons. "Hello, everybody. Ahem! I'm here to remove a chip from Dr. Bryar."

Tessa closed her eyes and ducked her head. Tell me he isn't, she thought to herself as Ted shouted for him to remove the vest. "I don't have any weapons," Spencer said. "The higher authority doesn't authorize it for technicians."

"Take it off!" Don't, Charlie. Leave it on. But he didn't, unfastening the velcro. "Come closer." Spencer walked forward, not looking at Tessa. "I want to see both of your hands at all times." He reached Ted and the latter motioned. "Sit across from me."

His hands were shaking as he opened the package and he cursed at himself. "Why are you so nervous?" The man holding the gun asked.

"I told you. I'm not used to being around guns."

"Do you know him?" Linda whispered where Tessa could barely hear it.

Tessa moistened her lips and nodded, almost imperceptibly. "This is going to probably sting a little bit," her brother told the man who had a gun aimed at him. Ted nodded and Tessa hated herself for feeling sorry for him with her brother's fingers digging in his arm. Then...

She almost grinned. She almost cheered. She almost launched at him, then she remembered she was handcuffed. He just, did a magic trick. She recognized the facial expression he had used to make when he was learning. When she told him that he never knew when it might save a life, she had never really thought about it with any level of truth. Yet, here they were.

"Whoa. Did you see that?"

"I knew it," Ted told them. "I knew it."

Spencer stood up to leave. "I've got to go to the higher authority. I'm supposed to-"

"Not yet!" He sat back down and Ted leaned forward. "Turn it on. Turn the chip on."

Everyone sort of looked at each other. "Excuse me?"

"Turn it on or I pull the trigger."

"I can't turn it on."

Ted's face went red. "Why not? Why not?"

"Because it has to be implanted," Tessa blurted.

Spencer didn't look over at her, but she was always looking out for him. "She's right. The chip derives its power from tiny electrical impulses fired between neurons. It has to be in your skin to work." Then he tried standing again. "I really gotta-"

"Sit down! You're not going anywhere."

"See?" The young boy said. "Dude actually had a chip in his arm."

The phone rang, but Ted made no movement to answer it. "It's probably the higher authority," Spencer said. "I told you, I have protocols to follow. I was supposed to go right back out there. I-I have rules. You want me to stay, I'm obviously going to stay, but, I mean you're going to be the one that has to explain it to the man."

"Why can't you all just leave me alone?" Ted asked.

"Leave you alone?" The kid asked. Tessa internally groaned.

"Stay out of this," the Briefcase Man said.

"No. The government does watch us. You got microwaves and satellites. I'm with you, man."

Spencer leaned over. "Do not agitate him."

But he wasn't listening. "Screw you."

Spencer turned back to Ted. "Dr. Bryar, answer the phone."

"My old man used to have tracking devices in his cars. He said it was for theft, but it's so he could find out where I'd go. And what about personal recordings and televisions? You don't think someone's monitoring everything you watch? You know how many patents are issued for devices to monitor people? Look it up, man."

"Answer the phone, Ted," Tessa said carefully.

Linda stood up. "Stop," she told the young man. "This isn't going to help."

"What the hell do you know?"

"Ted, he doesn't know what he's talking about. He's just a kid."

"Who you calling a kid?"

This was about to get bad. Tessa pulled at the handcuffs. "Sit down," she said to the kid.

"Oh, now you're gonna tell me what to do? He'd only have one gun if you weren't here. I'm with you, man."

"Answer the phone, Dr. Bryar. It's the higher authority."

The young man tried walking forward and Ted jumped out of his seat with the gun. "No!" Tessa said. There was a gunshot and a moment of almost everyone checking themselves, but Tessa's caramel eyes were widened at the blood seeping through Linda's sweater.

"Teddy?"

"Oh, damn. Damn!" The younger man helped lower her to the floor and Tessa yanked more against her restraints as Spencer moved forward to help. Ted went over to the phone and everyone crowded her.

Tessa tried to manually move people back just a little. "Wait, she needs space to breathe."

"Tessa," Spencer said. "What do we need to do?" She couldn't reach to help, but she tried before Spencer stopped her. "Just let me do it," he said. "You know what to do, tell me."

"Get it out. That's the first thing. You have to get it out and then try to bandage it or stop the bleeding. If you can regulate the bleeding then all you have to worry about is infection."

Ted was talking on the phone and Tessa caught just enough to know he had an end game; kill the hostages, then himself. Spencer, with a pair of tweezers, pulled most of the bullet from Linda, and the others were holding Tessa's crumpled jacket to the wound.

"Ted," she started. "No one on this train is an agent but me. No one else. I'm the only one. You can let everyone else go."

He shook his head and Spencer looked at him over his shoulder. "Dr. Bryar, we need to get this woman help."

"Who's gonna help me?"

"The higher authorities can help you. They're-they're not what you think. They're not the enemy. They can help you, Dr. Bryar."

Ted stood up, raised the gun, and turned to shoot the ringing telephone. "Not anymore." A few minutes went by and then Ted started talking to 'Leo' again. "It's not gone... you said when the chip came out, it would go away. It's- I still hear it... but you said it was the only one, Leo."

Tessa didn't like the look on Spencer's face and he turned slowly, like he was going to stand up. "Dr. Bryar."

"What?" He asked, pointing the gun.

"Charlie!" she hissed.

"It's alright, Tess," he told her.

Ted stood. "Is there another one?"

Spencer scoffed. "You know there isn't. If there were, Leo would've told you."

"Make it stop!" Ted shouted, covering his ears.

"I know what it's like," Spencer said, "I know what the voices are like. The voices, they won't stop. They've been talking to you since you were a child." Tessa furrowed her brow lightly and tunred to glance at her brother.

"You're lying to me," Ted accused.

"That's Leo speaking. That's not even Dr. Bryar." Spencer moved to look at the space next to Ted. "Why don't you let him think for himself, Leo?"

Ted followed his gaze. "You... do you see him?"

"Yeah, he's right there. Why don't you let him make his own decisions? The voices, they helped you, right? It's-it's where you get your ideas from. While the other kids were outside on the playground, you were inside reading, studying, learning. The voices wouldn't stop. They helped you understand things that other people could never realize. And then as you grew older, it became almost a responsibility, right? A responsibility to use that ability, to use your knowledge."

"String theory," Ted muttered. "The theory of everything."

"Then M-theory encompassing all strings," Spencer nodded. "Unifying the theories. You know, it's funny, most people say that M-theory can never be proved, because the mathematical tools do not yet exist. But you see it, right? Am I right? You can see the different strings unifying the dimensions, the gravitational infinities canceling each other out. You-you see them, right, Dr. Bryar? You see them because you have the tools. Your mind is that tool."

"Shut up!" Ted shouted to area 'Leo' was.

"And I have to believe," Spencer said, "that if you put your mind to it, you'll realize that only you can make Leo stop. You can make him stop by understanding him, by understanding that he is a liar, and he only wants bad things for you. I need to believe that, Dr. Bryar."

Ted apparently heard 'Leo' say something and turned, and Tessa yanked the gun out of his waistband and shoved him hard and Spencer tried to wrestle the gun away from him before... a gun shot sounded.

A moment later, the door opened and Tessa jerked her arm. "Gideon!" But he was looking at Briefcase Man who was aiming a gun, the gun that shot.

"I had to," he said. "He was going to kill us. I had to. God forgive me."

"We're going to need an ambulance," Spencer said.

* * *

Gideon helped Tessa out of the handcuffs, her wrist bleeding and swollen and definitely going to scar, and she launched herself at him. He hugged her back until she pulled away to hug Spencer, who then kissed her forehead and pulled away to look at her wrist, pulling her off the train to the medics on scene.

Derek was watching when Reid came out first, leading his little sister out of the train car gently by the hand and the bright sunlight hit her hair, which which he was only now just noticing had natural blonde highlights interweaving through the brown. She saw him, and smiled, and the sun got brighter. When he got closer he could hear the conversation.

"I don't need a hospital," she was saying.

"Are you joking?" Reid asked, pointing to her other wrist, the left one. "Your arm looks like someone tried to saw it off."

She didn't point out that maybe she almost had inadvertently. Derek hugged her and she hugged him back, burying her nose in his shirt that smelled vaguely of cinnamon and something that was just, male. It was comforting.

"Are you okay?" She asked him when he wouldn't let go.

He looked at her like she had grown another head. "Am _I_ okay? Are _you_ okay?"

"I'm fine, Charming. Honest."

Derek steered her towards the ambulances. "Let's get your arm looked at, shall we?"

As her wrist was being bandaged, Gideon came up to her. Spencer had run Derek off and they were sitting on the open trunk of a squad car with a medic wrapping up her wound. "Elisabeth." She looked up. "You okay?"

"I'm fine, Dad." She smiled weakly at the moniker and he laid a hand on her shoulder, patted it, and went to move on before he stopped.

"Elisabeth?" She thought he was going to tell her never to call him that again, but he didn't. "Call me that whenever you like."

He quickly walked away and she let out a breath she didn't realize she was holding, leaning her head against her brother's shoulder. "I love you, Charlie."

"I love you, Beetle."

 _"The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy in each others life." -Richard Bach._

 **A/N: Whew. So. DRAMA BOMB! I hope this chapter wasn't too confusing as I switched what I called the characters a lot, but it gave insight into their thoughts the way I wanted. I am really happy with how this turned out and I hope you guys are too. If not, let me know why. It is storming out something fierce! I love the rain. Sitting back, watching Criminal Minds, drinking milk, eating Twizzlers, with a sleeping puppy head in my lap. Perfect. Love always, Skye.**


	7. Home

Chapter seven: Home

 _"Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much." -Helen Keller_

Derek was watching her. She could feel his eyes as she wrote up a report, he at his desk and she at hers. She was trying to ignore it and every time she looked up he looked away, then a few minutes later would begin sneaking glances again. While sweet that he was worried still about the 'trauma' her train hostage situation caused, and the fact that Tessa wanted to think that wasn't the only reason he kept looking at her, she now just wanted him to stop. Tessa grabbed her jacket off the back of her chair and stood up, and both Spencer and Derek stood up too.

"Going to lunch?" Spencer asked.

"We'll go too," Derek said with a smile that made her feel sick in a good way.

Spencer looked at him appreciatively. "Yeah, I, uh, I could go for some pizza."

"No!" Tessa stressed. "Look, guys, I appreciate you both being worried about me, but I'm fine. Ted Bryar is locked up, my wrist is healing, stop smothering me. If I see either of you anywhere near the vicinity of the Pizza Joint for the next hour I will handcuff you to each other and give you both to Garcia as a gift. Am I understood?"

She didn't wait for a response, leaving quickly so she could get away. Spencer hated pizza, just like he hated trains, but she was not willing to force him to eat some because he was being a borderline stalker. It was raining outside when she emerged from the building and out into the parking lot to her Jeep. Tessa ducked under her umbrella and ran across, throwing open the driver side door and clambering into the sweltering summer humidity that was her car.

"That was some speech you made back there."

Tessa screamed and looked over to see Gideon sitting in her passenger seat. She took a breath and leaned her forehead against the steering wheel. He had been just the same as before, though perhaps a little more... there. She leaned back and started the car.

"What do you want, Gideon?"

"Well, for starters, you should probably lock your car when you leave it."

Spencer always made that same argument, but she didn't have anything in her car worth stealing and it drove him crazy. Plus, she liked not having to dig in her purse for her keys until _after_ getting in and out of the weather. "Yeah, well, that's not likely to happen."

"How about lunch?"

Tessa groaned. "Is this because you want to have lunch, or because I was hostage on a train for a day?"

Gideon frowned. "Both."

Tessa frowned too. "Okay. But it has to be pizza."

She ate pizza at least twice a week, but only because Spencer argued that it wasn't healthy to eat it every day, but... what he didn't know wouldn't hurt him.

* * *

"Do they have to add this much cheese?" He asked, looking a bit confused at the long strings of cheese from where he had picked up a piece.

"Yes," she told him. "They have to add this much cheese because it's perfect. Try it."

He knitted his eyebrows and smiled. "I'm old, Elisabeth, I might go into cardiac arrest."

She rolled her eyes. "Just eat the damn pizza."

"Yes, ma'am." And he took a bite, his eyebrows going up and he nodded his approval. "Okay, it's really good."

"I'm glad you braved the cardiac arrest threat." She put her own slice down on her plate and wiped her fingers on her napkin. "Gideon, are you okay?"

He looked startled for a moment. "Yeah. I'm fine. I just... how's your wrist?"

"Healing."

Gideon took a sip of his water, something healthy, he said, to counteract the staggering amount of cheese. "You know, I have a son." She had known that. He had that look that said he had children of his own. "Stephen and I, don't see eye to eye, I suppose. And I-"

"Feel guilty because you're feeling rather paternal to my brother and I but you haven't spoken to your own son in some time for the reason that you are closer to your team family than your actual family."

He blinked a few times. "You know, it alarms me how well you read me when-"

"You're usually the one that reads the rest of the team so well."

"Stop that." Then, "Yes."

"Call your son," she said. "Introduce him to the team and merge the two."

Gideon nodded. "Yeah. We, uh, should probably get back."

She smiled. "Okay. Derek and Spencer are probably going insane anyway, kind of makes me want to be late."

"Yes, I've noticed that they seem a bit, needy, lately."

"I don't know what's going on between them. One minute, they're friends. Then Charlie hates him. Now it's like they're not so much friends as they are allies against an enemy. I'm starting to feel like the enemy."

"They're just worried about you. You should have seen them when you were on the train, I've seen rabid dogs less confrontational."

Tessa nodded as they went to her car. It had stopped raining, but left the world feeling like a dark, humid blanket had been left behind to cover the world with dark clouds and rain puddles. "I understand that and Charlie's always been a bit over protective, but not like this."

"You honestly don't understand what's going on?"

She frowned. "Why? Do you?"

He sort of chuckled. "I'm going to let you figure that one out yourself."

"Tessa!" Spencer said when she and Gideon came in together. Then she was almost tackled in a hug from Derek and she pointed when Gideon looked back as if to say, do you see what I have to deal with? But he just laughed and went to his office to make a phone call...

* * *

Tessa frowned at the little piece of card-stock in her hands with bright, vibrant colors and bold lettering. A class reunion. Had it already been ten years? It didn't feel like it and there was no way she was going. Why hadn't Ash told her about it coming up? It would be nice to see her again come to think of it, but there was no way she was going alone. Spencer would never agree to come with her, or he would if only because of what happened the last time he didn't, and that wouldn't be right. He would hate it.

"What's wrong?" Derek asked, coming in through the front door. The team was meeting up for dinner and she, Derek, and Spencer were riding together since Spencer had more or less all but moved in to her guest room.

Tessa took a breath and looked up. "Um, high school reunion. It's strange, it feels like yesterday. No where near time for one."

"Are you gonna go?"

She set the invite on the counter. "I don't know. My automatic reaction is definitely not, but I do miss Ash. It would be nice to see her again."

Spencer was just coming around the corner of the hall way when Derek came to stand beside her in order to get a better look. "You should go. Prove to all those jerks how far you got. That's the whole point of reunions, right?"

"Reunion?" Spencer asked with a sniff of disdain. "That's ridiculous."

"I don't know. There were good times. Remember Ashleigh? You had a crush on her. I remember she'd come sit at our table in the library and you'd blush and hide your face behind a book or make that existentialist light bulb joke."

A pale blush bled to his cheeks when she brought this up. "Yeah. I remember, Beetle. But- you can't seriously be thinking about going."

She frowned. "I am actually. It could be fun, seeing Vegas from the point of view of a tourist. The lights, the people, the _life_."

"Yeah," he said shortly. "Magical. We're going to be late. We should go."

Derek's eyebrows shot up and Tessa sighed, smoothing out her knee length cocktail dress and looping her hand around Derek's arm for her to escort her. "Right. Let's get going."

It was dinner at a nice seafood restaurant downtown. Hotch and Garcia were apparently the first ones there. Then Emily and JJ at fairly the same time. Then Derek, Spencer, and Tessa arrived just as Gideon was getting out of his car. Derek pulled the key out of the ignition and rushed around to open Tessa's door, in a race as Spencer threw his seat belt off, only for them to be beaten by Gideon who rolled his eyes at the both of them.

"Have you really not figured it out yet?" He whispered in her ear.

"I'm starting to figure it out," she responded in referral to their earlier question of Spencer and Derek being strange with each other.

Gideon opened the door for her and the four of them met the others at their table, a large booth, in which Tessa again found herself in between Derek and Spencer with Gideon on the other side of Spencer. Hotch was next to Gideon, Emily next to him, with Garcia and JJ beside her in a broad half circle.

After ordering, Garcia took it upon herself to see what everyone had been up to. Hotch's new son, Jack, was starting to sleep more during the night, but still waking up a few times. Tessa still maintained that he had liked the name of her terrier so much he named his son that. She thought he knew she held that playful belief, and he didn't like it. Emily had been thinking about getting a cat. Garcia had been playing a new online game and shopping like a fiend. Gideon bought a new camera and set of binoculars for bird watching.

"Tessa's got her high school reunion coming up," Derek said.

Emily clicked her teeth. "Oh. The desire to go back and shove your success in their faces, ignite old flames, and laugh at the cheerleaders who never left town because they got saddled down young."

"You, uh, seem to speak from experience," JJ said with a laugh.

"Actually, I never had a high school to have a reunion at. I've just read about the supposed awkwardness."

The food came, the waitress winking at Derek as she passed the plates to their person and Tessa frowned, finding herself imagining shooting her in the forehead. She shook her head and blinked a few times to banish the image.

"I went to mine," JJ told them, "and it _was_ awkward. An old ex tried to stick his tongue down my throat. It was horrible."

"Well, there's little chance of that happening to me," Tessa commented.

Garcia glanced to her. "Because you don't have an ex?"

She chuckled, "No. Because then he wouldn't have a tongue."

Spencer looked up in alarm. "I never knew about a boyfriend."

"I don't know if you could call him a boyfriend, Charlie. It was just a few dates."

"Yeah. Dates I didn't know about. Who was it?"

Tessa wished she hadn't said anything. It wasn't a big deal. She hadn't told him because Garrett's older brother and Spencer graduated together and Damian had been his chief tormentor. Garrett wasn't as malicious like his brother. He was just, without a backbone to stand up to others. That wasn't the same, but Spencer wouldn't see a difference. "No one you would know, Charlie."

"I know the names of your entire graduating class."

Gideon cleared his throat, sensing this could turn ugly if Spencer forced Tessa to answer, or tried to. "I think you should go," he told her. "You could go, see all of your friends, smirk secretively at your nemesis, all that jazz."

"You know, I think I will."

* * *

"Who was it?" The question made her jump at three in the morning when she came downstairs for a snack because she couldn't sleep. She gave a bit of a shriek and grabbed the counter with another hand over her heart.

"Jesus, Charlie! Don't do that." She reached over and flipped the light on. There he stood in his robe and dark circles under his eyes.

"Who was he?"

Tessa didn't answer at first, opening the fridge and pulling out a Greek yogurt, and a spoon from a drawer. "His name is Garrett Frost."

The effect was instantaneous as his face got redder than she'd ever seen except for that one time, when at eight, they'd had a bet that she started to see who could hold their breath longer. He'd won. Then he passed out. "Frost?" He repeated in a quiet tone that almost made her flinch. "As in _Damian_ Frost?"

"His brother isn't like him, Charlie. It didn't even go anywhere. Do you remember when I called you to come get me? At the pizza place and we rode home on your bike with me on the handlebars? That was the last time I saw him outside of school functions."

"Why?" He asked. "If he isn't like his brother, why didn't it go anywhere?"

Tessa wasn't sure how to answer. Garrett really _hadn't_ been as bad as his brother. He was just... a victim of peer pressure. An influenced member of the community that stated you were either the bully or the bullied. He wasn't Damian. "Because I was too much like mine."

The words hung in the air and Tessa was afraid it came out wrong, that it was harsh, but he seemed to understand what she didn't say. He was good at that. "I don't mean to be pushy," he said, taking a seat at the bar and taking an apple from the bowl of Granny Smiths and Red Delicious'. "You're my sister and I love you more than anyone else. I just want you to be happy."

"I know, Charlie. I love you too, but you can't protect me from everything. Especially when there's nothing to protect me from." She tossed her empty yogurt cart into the trash can and her spoon in the sink, walking around to kiss his head before walking back upstairs to try in vain to sleep.

* * *

She woke again not an hour later with a phone call, which she could barely see through squinted eyes said Ashleigh, and picked up with a groggy greeting. After half a moment, though, who was to say how long a moment has to be to be considered a moment- she jerked into an upright position at the breathy tone to her best friend's voice.

"Ash? What's wrong?" She tried not to think back to a night just over ten years ago that she received a similar call from her.

"She's dead." There was a hitch in Tessa's breathing as there had been ten years ago and Ash had said the same thing. "I'm in trouble. They think I did it, but I swear, Tess, I didn't. Please, I just, I need help."

Tessa threw her blanket off and swung her legs to the side off the bed, turning on the lamp beside her. "Ash, I need you to calm down. Who's dead?"

"Cadence," her friend sobbed.

Cadence? Cadence Reagan? "Cadence Reagan?" The girl on the phone sniffed and gave an affirmative. Cadence was a pretty girl, what Spencer would call- a mean girl. Tessa stood up and left her room to walk across the hall to Spencer's room. "Alright, Ash. Charlie and I will be there tomorrow. I'll get you out of this, I promise."

They hung up and Tessa found herself banging on Spencer's door and then throwing the door open. He'd almost been hit by the door as he had been coming to open it. She walked past him and started pacing his room, which was rather small. "Ash is in trouble," she told him, repeating everything that Ashleigh had told her.

She could see the wheels in his head turn as he nodded to himself on what he thought they had to do. "Okay," he said. "Okay. You go pack and I'll call Hotch- tell him we need a few personal days. You pack and get the plane tickets. We'll take a cab."

Tessa nodded dumbly and left to her room, turning on the light and pulling her old suitcase out of her closet to leave open on her bed. The she went over to laptop, pulling up a travel site to purchase the tickets- two that boarded in just under three hours. She couldn't believe her luck. She started pulling things out of her dresser, then to the wardrobe in the closet where she yanked things out and tossed them to her suitcase.

By the time she was done, Spencer was at her door with his own suitcase. "Cancel the flights," he said. "JJ got us invited. It's our case."

She hugged him tightly. "Oh, thank God. Let's go, I'll cancel them on the way."

* * *

"They sent us their files on the murder," JJ told them on the jet. "There were two. Miranda Cross Tuesday and Cadence Reagan yesterday."

Tessa shook her leg and restrained from pulling out her hair. "Miranda Cross?"

"You know her?" Gideon asked.

She nodded. "She was in our class, mine and Ash's. She, uh, well, she was a bully. She and Cadence both were. What about the crime scene?"

"Miranda Cross' hair was shaved," Hotch said, "and her nails were pulled from her nail beds. Cadence Reagan was... oh my God, she was, she was _skinned_. But, they were both beaten to death."

Tessa felt like she was going to throw up and then Emily said, "What's with the crickets?"

Her head shot up. "Crickets? What crickets?"

"There were crickets found on and around the bodies," Gideon told her slowly, watching her face turn green. "Why? Does that mean something to you?"

Tessa went to nod, went she tore out of her seat and to the bathroom where she unloaded the contents of her stomach. A moment later, Derek was holding her hair back and Spencer was at the door, looking on worriedly. When she was done, she sat back against Derek and he held her for a few minutes before helping her up. After another few minutes, she came out from brushing her teeth and sat down beside Derek, him wrapping an arm around her.

"Cricket is what we called Ashleigh's sister, Cindy. She hated that name. Before she died it brown, she had red hair and green eyes that were too big for her face. Ash always told her it made her look like a bug so we called her Cricket." Tessa remembered the day she died her hair, hating the red where Ash embraced it, and they all joked that she looked more like Tessa's twin than Ashleigh's. "She was bullied, badly. Ash and I tried to stop it when we could, but none of us were someone people listened to. When they were seventeen, and I was fifteen, Cricket committed suicide. Ash found her in bed with the pill bottle still in her hand."

Her voice broke on the last word and she covered her mouth. "That's why they think it's her. Miranda and Cadence were awful to her. To everyone. Miranda, she was terribly vain about her hair. Cadence had perfect skin. It was something everyone associated them with."

"Then the unsub is trying to deprive them of it," Hotch said.

Gideon set the file down and looked her in the eye. "Elisabeth, I need to know. Is there any possible way your friend could have done this?"

Her expression was adamant, but she wasn't the one that answered. "None." Everyone except Tessa turned to look at Spencer. "Ashleigh was distraught over what happened to Cricket, we all were, but she didn't blame anyone for her sister's death except maybe herself. Even there, she was able to later accept that her sister needed help. It was no one's fault. One of those tricks nature plays."

That last sentence was a direct quote. Tessa remembered when her friend had said that. "Ashleigh isn't capable of this. I can't think of anyone I knew that is."

"Well," Derek held her hand, "we'll find out who did this," he whispered close to her ear.

* * *

"I'm Captain Jay Travis," he said, shaking JJ's hand. "We spoke on the phone. It's a privilege to be working alongside you. Truly."

"Thank you," Hotch told him. "I'm SSA Aaron Hotchner. You've met our Communications Liaison, Jennifer Jareau. This is SSA's Jason Gideon, Emily Prentiss, Derek Morgan, Elisabeth Reid, and Dr. Spencer Reid."

The man, an older man with a very well maintained head of graying hair and a bit of a portly figure, frowned. "Did you say Reid?"

Las Vegas was big, the twenty eighth biggest city in the United States and the most biggest in Nevada, but it was broken into different sections- each section a large part of the city in and of its self. She'd lived Downtown and though the sections were big, each felt like a small town though. She supposed it wasn't surprising that the Downtown section Captain knew their name.

"Where is Ashleigh Keogh?" She asked instead of answering.

He blinked a few times and pointed behind him. "The interrogation room."

Tessa brushed past him and towards the room where she threw the door open. Someone was sitting across from her and stood when the door opened and went to stop her, but she pulled her badge out and tossed it roughly at him before pulling her friend to her in a desperate embrace. Ash held onto her hard, crying into her shoulder. Then,

"Tessa?"

Her closed eyes, that she hadn't realized she'd closed, flashed open. Garrett. There were footsteps behind her. "Elisabeth?" That was Gideon and Tessa moved away from her friend to address the team.

"Ash, this is my team. We're going to get you out of this. I promise." She pulled Ash to them by the hand and introduced everyone. "Guys, this is my friend, Ashleigh. And-" Tessa looked back at Garrett, whom she hadn't seen since graduation. He still had those blue eyes. "This is Garrett Frost. An old friend."

"Friend?" He echoed. "Is that all?"

She looked away. "Where are we set up?"

Derek clenched his jaw at the look this Frost guy was giving his girl. And the way she'd looked at him for that split moment before he brought up the past. He stepped into the room and grabbed her hand, interlocking their fingers. "I'll show you."

* * *

Lieutenant, in the ten years since they'd graduated, Garrett had become a lieutenant in the Downtown Police Department. Tessa had gone to school and left with a doctorate and two bachelors. Ash had gone and started her own coffee shop/bookstore with pun based drinks from her favorite books and poems. She supposed they'd each done well for themselves.

"Our unsub is male, mid to late twenties. The murders were spurred by the high school reunion, but we can't let ourselves get caught up in that. He might just live in the area. He obviously blames these victims for Cynthia Keogh's suicide, and from that we think he had romantic feelings for her most likely before her death- but it is possible that he obsessed over her afterwards and became overwhelmed by feelings then. He's reckless, not stopping to be careful with leaving a trail and only worried about vengeance. When we find him he may respond best if Ashleigh talks to him. He probably works a menial job, not under any large amount of supervision, and very submissive in nature. You wouldn't notice him at first."

Derek couldn't help but notice that while Gideon gave the profile, the Frost fellow watched Tessa. It was obvious, to him at least, that she noticed too as she would start to look that way and stop herself. He stood beside her, behind Emily and Hotch, and he reached over and grabbed her hand, squeezing it gently. She squeezed back. And he smiled.

"We're wanting to keep this out of the press," Spencer said. "He wants to call attention to these murders and what he's trying to represent with them. We leave that out of the press, and he'll most likely contact us which will help us find him."

"I need to talk to you," Derek whispered lowly in her ear.

Then a phone rang.

 _"If one suffers we all suffer. Togetherness is strength. Courage." -Jean-Bertrand Aristide_

 **A/N: Whew. Hope you like this chapter, guys. I'm actually REALLY proud of it. So, there's a website where you can literally design a house and I LOVE IT! I've been using it to create what I think my characters houses would be so I can use it in my stories. It's called and it's free to do. You don't even have to sign up if you don't want.**

 **So, I'm not going to make much more of a big deal to the drama with Tessa, Morgan, and Garrett than I have. It may or may not come to a head at some point, but she's Morgan's girl and has been from the start. It's a bit obvious. Also, there were concerns of favoritism. Every parent has a favorite and any who say they don't is lying, I just never happened to be either of mine. Maybe favorite isn't the right word. Gideon loves all three of them- Spencer, Tessa, and Stephen equally, but he identifies the most with Tessa. He feels more connected with Tessa. But I'm not trying to write her as his** ** _favorite_** **. Is that coming out right? Anyway...**

 **Ashleigh will not be a huge part of my story, but she will be recurring I think- from time to time. Who else totally flipped out when Reid got shot in the neck at the end of the ninth season? I was freaking! I may not go too much in detail about the actual case, but focused more on the in between and personal stuff this case brings. Like an appearance from Garrett's older brother- Damian.**

 **Love always, Skye.**


	8. Haunted

Chapter eight: Haunted

 _"Fear not for the future, weep not for the past." -Percy Bysshe Shelley_

There was another one, a man this time. "So," Derek said in the car on the way to the crime scene. "Garrett Frost."

Tessa was staring out of the window and wondering, with no small amount of dread, who it would be. She and Spencer had made a list of Cricket's top tormentors, but it had been too long. The police department was now focusing on getting a warning out to those people. At Derek's interruption to her thoughts, she looked over to him. "It was a long time ago."

"And you're not, I don't know, wanting to go back to it?"

She had to look away from him at this moment to keep him from seeing her hopeful expression. "Not at all," she told him. "I'm not interested in him like that anymore."

They pulled up to the hotel, the man was staying in a hotel, and got out of the car- following the trail of officers to the room. When they entered the room, it was a mess- an obvious struggle as there was furniture overturned and broken glass grounded into the stained beige carpet. Then she saw the body.

"Did you know him?" Derek asked her as he watched her face pale.

She didn't know what was wrong, she wasn't usually so squeamish. Tessa nodded. "Marcos Lowell, he's on the list."

Derek handed her a pair of bright green gloves. "What's the story there?" He asked her.

"He, uh, he told the entire school that Cricket... that she, that she was easy. That she had sex with him. That spurred more taunting, people started calling her a slut when she walked down the hallways." He'd been castrated.

He grimaced, no doubt feeling the dead man's pain, and looked around to the mess. Tessa examined her ex classmates body. "He has skin under his nails," she told him. "Our unsub will have marks, most likely on his arms and face." Her phone rang and she answered it. It was Hotch. "Yellow."

She could hear road noise in the background. They were driving. "I think you and Morgan should go to the high school. There are people there setting up for the reunion, see if maybe they've seen anything strange lately."

"Will do, Boss Man."

"Oh, and, Tess?"

She frowned a smiled at Hotch calling her Tess. "Yeah?"

"Stop hanging out with Garcia so much and don't call me Boss Man."

Tessa hung up with a broader smile and she looked over to Derek. "Did you know Garcia has him in her phone as Sir Hotch?"

"You mean like you do?" He joked back. She rolled her eyes and they went back out to the car where she had convinced him to let her drive, which wasn't easy. "So where are we headed?"

Her nerves were jittery and she tapped her thumbs on the steering wheel as she drove, glancing at herself to subtly make sure her hair wasn't a complete mess. It felt like her world, a world she didn't even think about, was shaking violently around her and threatening to shake entirely apart. It didn't even totally make sense to her. "The high school," she told him. "Hotch wants to see if anyone has seen anything."

"You okay?" Derek asked, suddenly worried when she rolled her shoulders in an attempt to adjust her necklace without taking her hands from the wheel. He knew she didn't do it because she didn't like removing her hands- he'd seen her drive while eating a slice of pizza with one hand and holding a beverage in the other. She was nervous.

She looked over, saw his expression, and turned her expression back to the road. "Yeah. I'm fine."

"You know I can tell when you're lying, right?" He pointed to her. "You nibble on the inside of your lip and your voice gets breathy."

Tessa pursed her lips and made a turn. "Right. I'm just- I haven't seen anyone from my class outside of Ash since graduation. I wasn't exactly in high demand."

He reached over and pulled her right hand from the wheel to hold over the center console. "It's all good, princess. But things are different now and you've got us. Hell, you've got _me_."

She realized then she probably shouldn't have driven as they had been parked in front of the building for a minute and she didn't notice- completely on auto pilot. "Let's just get this over with."

He followed her through the double doors and she followed her feet, thinking it strange that the path still seemed ingrained. She still remembered every step, every hallway. They went up to the front desk, where people who weren't faculty or students were meant to get a visitors pass. It was still the same secretary. How old was this woman? She looked like she was older than God with pale blonde hair and bright lipstick that didn't stop on her lips. Tessa and Derek pulled their badges out and showed them to her as they approached the desk.

"Mrs. Harris? I'm Agent Elisabeth Reid, this is SSA Derek Morgan. We're with the FBI. Would you mind if we asked you a few questions?"

The woman frowned, making the wrinkles on her face run together. "Elisabeth Reid. I know you." Tessa felt a bit happy that Mrs. Harris remembered her, she used to work in the office doing filing and whatnot. She was a bit of a nerd- doing marching band, office assistant, library assistant, she even did debate team for a while until Spencer brought it up to her that she started arguing everything just for the sake of doing so.

"Yes," she said. "I filed papers for you in school."

"That's right. Good for you, now, what can I do you for you two?"

Tessa smiled a little. "Have you noticed anything strange around the school lately? Any odd or alarming messages? People coming around that make you feel uneasy?"

She gave her a look. "Honey, it's Vegas. Everyone makes me uneasy, besides, it's summer and aside from the teachers only the reunion committee has been here- setting up."

"Right," Derek said. "Thank you, Mrs. Harris. If you don't mind, we're just going to take a look around."

"By all means," then she winked at Tessa. "Hold on to this one, honey, just look at those muscles. Mmm, if I was forty years younger..."

Tessa blushed and tried to hide her smile, following Derek. He nudged her gently with an elbow. "Hold on to this one, eh?"

She pushed him playfully. "Shut up. Come on, the gym's this way." But, she had every chance of holding on to him.

The gym was done up, the reunion still on for that evening. There were fairy lights strung up around the room and Tessa was somewhat glad that the committee had foregone the cliched disco ball. There were paper lamps hanging and other assortments of crafts that Tessa hadn't even seen out of strange catalogs she'd see in passing at a store. And they weren't done. Tessa's brows shot up, as did Derek's.

There was a group of girls to one side of the gym, taking a break from climbing up and down ladders, and ten years hadn't done anything to take away from who they each obviously were and Tessa knew them all. She felt frozen looking at the girls that literally did their best to make her life hell. Once, in gym class, Natalie Hayden and Jordan Waters put peroxide in her shampoo. Tessa was allergic to peroxide, she had to be taken to the ER.

Luckily, Derek saw her stricken face, and took the lead. "Excuse me, ladies?" A few turned, then nudging the others to turn around too until they were all staring at Derek and Tessa snapped out of it- stepping closer to Derek. "I'm Agent Morgan, this is Agent Reid, we're with the FBI. We'd like to ask you a few questions regarding the murders as of late."

A pretty woman, at about twenty-nine, stepped forward as the speaker for the rest and Tessa recognized her as Farrah Kyle. She held her head up a notch higher. She wasn't a scared fifteen year old anymore, without her brother close by for the first time. "Anything we can do to help," Farrah told him in a somewhat sultry tone that made Tessa want to throw up.

"Have any of you seen anything strange lately? Frightening messages? Sketchy people?"

"Nothing like that, but if you give me your number I'll be sure to call you if I do." It was a familiar smirk. A smirk Tessa was familiar with and usually meant there was a balloon full of paint waiting for her.

She cleared her throat. "Were any of you still in contact with either Miranda Cross or Cadence Reagan?"

"No." She said flatly. "We weren't."

"We're looking for a Caucasian male," Derek told them, addressing the others as opposed to Farrah. "He'll be in his mid to late twenties, submissive and shy around women but have a nasty anger when pushed. He works a menial job, something he doesn't have to interact with people a lot; telemarketer, construction, repairman, anything like that. He's not someone you'd usually notice. He may live in the area, or may just be in town for the reunion."

Farrah shrugged. "Sorry. Don't know anyone like that."

"Could we get a list of everyone that's RSVP'd to come to the reunion?" Tessa asked.

"I don't know if we should be handing something over like that for no reason."

Derek stepped closer. "I'm sorry, she wasn't asking. You see, we're working on a murder investigation and we need that list."

Farrah had another look, really she only had a few, and this one was the same one Tessa had gotten when she had to tell Farrah in their world history class that we didn't nuke China. But Japan. Tessa was astounded that nothing had changed since school. Or maybe, she wasn't so surprised.

"Fine." She moved over to a rather large purse on a chair and came back with a printed list, bring it over to Tessa. Then she stopped with a frown. "Don't I know you?"

Derek grabbed Tessa's hand. "Probably. My girlfriend and her brother actually attended here. This is Tessa's reunion too."

Then her face was sour and Tessa could tell she remembered her. "Elisabeth?" She scoffed. "Yes. I remember you. Here's that list, and if you won't mind, we have work that needs to be done."

"We'll let you get to it then," Derek said, leading Tessa out by the hand. They had almost made it to the front door again, when they ran into someone. Literally. Without Derek, Tessa would have fallen.

"I'm so sorry," he said, the man she bumped into that had been rushing around the corner. "You're not hurt, are you?"

Tessa brushed her pants off. "No, no, of course not. Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm- Tess?"

She looked up and grinned at the man with dirty blonde hair, "Mason?!" Then she hugged him tightly, pulling away to get a better look at him. "You're here for the reunion?"

"I-I am, you know, my sister being on the committee and all. Uh, are you? I heard you moved across country with your brother."

She nodded. "I did. He and I are in the FBI. We're actually investigating the murders that have happened. Have you heard?"

Tessa didn't notice the stricken look on his face, but Derek did. "Y-yes, I, I had heard something like that. Are you close to catching him?"

"Very," Derek said. "We'll catch him and make sure they face justice."

Mason nodded and Tessa seemed to remember her manners. "Oh! Mason, this is my friend and colleague, Derek Morgan. Derek, this is a very good friend of mine and Ash's- Mason Waters."

"Were you also friends with Cindy?" Derek said that and Tessa's smile fell, her eyes shifting to Derek's quickly before going back to her friend.

All expression dropped from Mason's face. "She hated that name," he said tightly.

Derek snapped his fingers. "That's right. What was it she preferred?"

"I have to go," Mason said, backing up a few feet. Tessa was thinking back to all the times she, Ash, Spencer, Cricket, and Mason would sit in the library- Spencer reading some obscure textbook from his own classes at Caltech and the rest of them on their own assignments. The glances she'd catch Mason throw Cricket, who was like a little sister to everyone, but she'd ignored them in favor of the ones Spencer gave Ash. How could she be so stupid? It's not like there were a lot of people who were close to them. Zero, really.

She and Derek left, sitting in the car in silence for a moment as they each thought to themselves. Derek breached the topic first. "Tess-"

"I know," she said. "It's him, isn't it?"

"Yes. I think so. We need to call Hotch."

She was still borderline in shock. "Right. You call him."

* * *

He was gone. There was no doubt, after a call to Hotch, a trip back to the station, and a conference call with Garcia, that Mason Waters was the unsub. He had come into town, working at a customer call center in Sierra, the morning before the first killing. He'd posted a remembrance for Cricket on his social media and had pictures of her online. Then, he was gone. They went to his hotel room, but he was gone- leaving behind a mess of pictures featuring people Spencer, Tessa, Ash, and Garrett knew. Bullies, the murdered ones with their faces crossed off violently.

Derek's phone rang and he answered it. "Give us something good, baby girl. We found nothing but a whole lot of creepy."

"I wish I could, my chocolate thunder, but you and and my princess have trouble coming your way. About a month ago, Mason bought a gun. And something called triacetone triperoxide."

Derek's eyes widened. "TATP? That's what they used in that bomb attack on Paris."

"Also called tri-cyclic acetone peroxide," Spencer said. "Acetone peroxide takes the form of a white crystalline powder with a distinctive bleach-like odor and can explode if subjected to heat, friction, or shock."

"That's his end game," Gideon said. "He'll be at the reunion."

Emily looked alarmed, blinking a few times. "Should we have them cancel it?"

Tessa shook her head. "No. He'd up his game and then we don't know where he'd strike. Our best bet is to go and try to blend in so we can apprehend him."

"He won't just plant the bomb and run?" JJ asked. "Otherwise, he risks himself being harmed in the blast. Or-"

"That's his plan. This is his end game, complete with suicide."

* * *

Spencer didn't like it, and he told her so. He, Derek, Hotch, and Gideon were able to wear, albeit uncomfortably, a vest under their button ups and suit jackets- but the girls couldn't. He didn't like that she was going out without sufficient protection. Derek didn't either.

"Charlie," she called from inside the bathroom as she got dressed and he paced outside the door waiting for her. "We're going to find him and arrest him before anyone can get hurt. This is Mason we're talking about. He won't hurt me."

"Ten years ago, Beetle, I wouldn't have thought he could hurt anyone. He isn't Mac anymore." Mac. Mac-n-cheese, Mason's favorite food. He nearly worshiped it the way Tessa did pizza. Spencer was right. He _wasn't_ Mac anymore. He was Mason Waters, serial killer. Her unsub.

Tessa opened the bathroom door, pulling on the bottom of the dress she'd bought last minute that was short enough to run in and long enough to cover a gun strapped to her thigh in a deep wine color. He hair was pulled up in a chignon and a clear, glossy lip gloss barely touched her lips. Heels, clear and silver heels that she would admit were her new favorites.

"Well," she twirled dramatically and somewhat sarcastically. "What do you think?"

"I think we should still try and get you into a vest. You going out there without one is not okay."

Tessa smiled and hugged him. "Charlie, I have you and Derek watching out for me. I trust you guys. Not to mention the rest of the team. JJ will be waiting on the sidelines as will Emily. They'll be fine. I'll be fine. You don't need to worry."

"It's been scientifically proven that worrying can be motivating."

"It can also be debilitating," she insisted. "Let's go, everyone's waiting."

* * *

She had to hand it to them, the gym had been transformed. She didn't go to prom, but she imagined this is what it would have looked like, which was ridiculous. Most of them were thirty year olds wanting to be sixteen again. Tessa knew for a fact she was the youngest in the room. She and Spencer were to stay together, the rest of the team fairly out of the way and out of sight. Tessa wasn't mingling with anyone but Spencer and Ash, who was there under much duress and still upset about being a suspect in the beginning. There was a tap on her shoulder and Garrett was asking for a dance.

"I don't know," she said.

 _"_ _You should,"_ Emily suggested over comms. _"You need to loosen up or he'll spook if he's here."_

Tessa knew that Garrett could hear what Emily said, his face fell a fraction, but his hand was still held out for her and Spencer glared at him the way he had any time they'd been in the same room together. She took it hesitantly and let him lead her in a waltz.

"I make you uncomfortable," he said in a quiet, somber tone.

She moistened her lips. "Well, yes, you do, and you haven't done anything to try and not to since I got here."

There was a spin and he nodded. "I know. I'm sorry. I-I haven't forgotten about you. I've thought about you since that night you broke my nose." She went to say something, probably something about how she wasn't interested, but he wasn't done. "But you're _his_ girl aren't you? That steroid guy."

"I'm not in a relationship, Garrett."

"I didn't say you were, but that doesn't mean you aren't his girl already. If you aren't now, give him a week and you will be. So, let's you and I just have a dance." He spun her and dipped her and a moment after, it was over and she felt much more at peace. Then she saw him.

"I see him," she said.

 _"_ _So do we,"_ Gideon's voice said and she realized that the entire team just heard her conversation.

But if they cornered him, he'd freak out. "Wait! Let me do it. I can get him to surrender without getting anyone hurt. If you guys go, he'll panic and start shooting."

 _"_ _No,"_ Morgan said. _"You don't have a vest."_

But Tessa was already walking up to him. "Mac!"

He stopped and turned, his dark brown eyes narrowing. "I can't remember the last time you called me that. It won't stop me. I know you know. It's the only way you'd come to the ridiculous spectacle. But don't you remember her? Don't you remember her smile? The curls of her hair? No one remembers her. She should be here tonight, but they killed her."

"You don't think we remember? She was Ash's _sister._ She was _our_ sister. I still have a picture of her on my dresser and I still think about her. We all loved her, Mac. But they didn't kill her. She killed herself. Please. If you just turn yourself in, we can get you help."

Her friend was crying. "No one's going to help me. I loved her so much. I just- I can't do this anymore. She called me that night. She asked me to for help, told me she was in a bad place, but, I'd been drinking. Told her I couldn't. It was my fault."

"No," she cried. "It wasn't. Please."

"I'm sorry." He raised the gun to under his chin and she grabbed at his arm to stop him.

And then it went off.

 _"For of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: 'It might have been.'" -John Greenleaf Whittier_

 **A/N: Sooo, yeah. I based Ashleigh on an old friend of mine. We were impossibly close when we were kids and though we've grown apart, she's still one of the best friends I could ever ask for. So, to Erika. Also, my godmother's boyfriend was my best friend and when he, my godmother, and my mom were in high school- their friend committed suicide. The friend called Ellis to tell him he needed him, but Ellis couldn't get there and the friend killed himself. Ellis eventually drank himself to death. This broke my heart at the time and I very much used it here. It was very painful at the time.**

 **Garrett has given a truce as she is and always has been Morgan's girl. He's about to get on that by the way. Mason fucked up. He has issues. But he's still Tessa's friend and she'll do anything she can to help him. Side note. I am looking for good fics to read. But I'm picky. No canon couples, I don't really like Emily, has to be complete. Preferably long and I hate slow burns. If you know any like that, hit me up. Love always, Skye.**


	9. Aftermath

Chapter nine: Aftermath

 _"If you have to do it, then you are doing the right thing." -Kathy Valentine_

There was a ringing in her ears as it went off right next to her face and she felt like the left side of her face was on fire. She briefly registered a pain in her thigh and saw spots in one eye, but through the other watched Mason's eyes widen in fear. Tessa thought she could see him throw the gun aside, the gun that in their struggle he had lost his grip on and it rotated- going off almost right on her face and from the feeling of it, hit her. He grabbed her and pulled her to him as she lost her balance. The spots on her vision were starting to clear, but there was still ringing. And shouting.

"Let her go!"

"Stop," she said, then realizing they couldn't hear her, spoke louder. "Stop. He's just trying to help."

Then there was an exchanging of hands and Gideon was carrying her, taking her away from Mason and to a clear spot on the ground where he leaned her against the wall and lifted her dress hem an inch or two to look at the wound. Oh. She was bleeding. A lot. "It's going to be okay," Gideon told her, his voice strained. His hands were bloody too from keeping pressure to her wound. He was shaking.

"Please don't let them hurt him," she said, the ringing not as thunderous as it had been. The lights seemed to be fading in and out and the world was spinning faster on its axis. Someone was squeezing her hand and she was trying hard to stay awake, but fading in and out with the lights and sounds.

"Charlie," she slurred. "Wh-where's-"

And then she was out.

* * *

"How is she?" was the first thing out of Derek's mouth as he, Hotch, and JJ were the last ones to make it to the hospital. Spencer and Tessa were obviously the first, shortly followed by Gideon and Emily.

"She's going to be fine," Emily told him. "She just went back into surgery."

Spencer came in from getting a cup of coffee and sat down next to Gideon with his vest in his hands and Jason patted his back. He just as anxious as the kid, despite knowing that she had gotten to the hospital in time for them to stop the bleeding. She _would_ have bled out without Derek's belt. A woman came into the waiting room and looked up from a clipboard.

"Elisabeth Reid?" Six people, five really as Hotch hadn't sat down, stood up. "Are _all_ of you family?"

Spencer took a few steps closer. "I'm her brother."

"Well, she's stable for now. They have her back in surgery, but we are really low on blood and need more of her type. Can you give a donation?"

"Absolutely," Spencer said without hesitation, already putting his coffee down and rolling up his shirt sleeves. "Anything. She'll be okay?"

The woman nodded. "We got to her in time and we were able to clamp the artery. The bullet went through her femoral artery. Who's idea was it to use the belt as a tourniquet?" Derek's head jerked up. After he'd handed her off to Gideon, he'd taken his belt off to give him. The woman noticed his movement and turned her eyes to him. "It saved her life."

He let out a long sigh in relief and put his head in his hands. He'd never been so grateful for anything. Gideon let out his own grateful breath. Spencer stopped dead. "I-I can't. We don't have the same blood type. I have A positive."

"You're twins," Derek said. Reid had to have her blood type. Derek had O positive. He couldn't. Reid looked heartbroken.

"We're fraternal, not identical. If-if we were identical..."

Jason Gideon looked up. "I have O neg. I could donate to her, right?"

The woman nodded. "Absolutely. O negatives are universal donors."

He stood up, trying to avoid Spencer's desperate expression. "Let's do it. Whatever you need. Let's do it."

* * *

The woman was back, looking much better this time than wearing the worried expression she had the last time. "She's awake and everything is fine. Um, she is asking for a Charlie though. She's being a bit out of control."

Spencer smiled through glassy eyes. "What room?"

"Uh, 304." Without anything else said, six people rushed down the hall- Spencer and Derek semi running. And there she was, laying on the bed with her eyes open and blinking slowly.

She looked up and smiled, a tired smile that made the world feel brighter from that disgusting, darkness that had weighed down on them. "Charlie," she whispered.

"Hey, Beetle." He said, moving into the chair beside her bed as people shuffled into the room.

"Is Mason okay?"

"Yeah," he told her. "Mason's going to be fine. He's terrified he hurt you."

Tessa moistened her lips. "Someone should call and tell him I'm okay."

Spencer nodded. "I will." Then, "What were you thinking? You're lucky it hit your thigh and no where else. You're lucky it hit your femoral artery and not your carotid or you would have bled out and Morgan's belt wouldn't have done a damn bit of good!"

"I couldn't let Mac do that to himself, Charlie. We were friends, his murders don't change that. I-I had to do something."

She was a bleeding heart, Spencer cursed to himself, but damned it he wouldn't have done the same. He knew he would have. "I know, Beetle."

Tessa looked up at everyone else. "Hey, guys."

Derek walked around to behind Spencer where he could smooth her hair out behind her ear. "Hey, princess. You gave us one hell of a scare."

"Sorry. I didn't mean to worry you guys."

"How are you feeling?" Gideon asked. Tessa caught the bandage at his elbow where he had given blood and she smiled.

"Pretty good, all things considered. It hurts, but its manageable until I move it. I'm told it'll give me a cool scar. Hanging out with you guys made me feel a bit left out in that aspect."

Hotch stepped closer. "We'll be here if you need us. And after, Strauss has promised us all a vacation, so, get better."

There was paperwork to be filed, things to be tied up at the police department, and Hotch left the room- shortly followed by Emily and JJ with a hug each. Spencer held her hand in both of his and kissed her knuckles. Gideon sat on the other side of her bed and Derek stood, leaning against the wall behind Spencer, watching her carefully. "You guys are acting like I've already died. I'm fine. I can leave in a few days, our unsub's in custody, we'll go visit Mom, go home, and Spencer can finally finish moving in instead of subtly bringing more of his stuff into my house."

Spencer's head shot up and he looked at her with a guilty expression, like when they were kids and he would eat the last cookie. "What?"

"I really don't need a spare room," she said. "It's your room. Move all of your stuff in and let's just be done with that. Besides, Jack misses you."

"That dog is demonic," he protested.

Derek laughed. "Reid, he's a dog. A very cute dog."

Tessa glanced at Gideon, who was wearing his best smile-but-not-a-smile smile, then back to Spencer. "Hey, Charlie? Do you think you could do me a favor?"

"Anything," he said before she could barely finish the question.

"I am craving a smoothie." He looked like he wanted to take back his previous statement, but couldn't avoid her puppy eyes. He sighed, kissed her knuckles again, and stood up to leave. After a moment to be sure he was gone, she turned to Derek who put his hands up in surrender before smiling.

"Don't have to send me off for an errand. I get it." He stepped forward and leaned down, pressing his lips to her forehead and closing his eyes before leaving.

She watched him go and turned to Gideon. "In my defense, a smoothie really does sound amazing."

He smiled at her. "I'm really glad you're okay."

"Thank you. It's a bit hazy, but I remember you putting the belt around my leg tight. They told me that's what saved my life."

"It was Morgan's belt."

She nodded to his arm. "If you tell me it was his blood too, I'm calling bull."

Jason looked down at the purple gauzy bandage around the crook of his elbow. His daughter needed him. His daughter. He frowned the way he did anytime he had that thought. It made all sorts of other thoughts come up. In Virginia, a legal stranger or non relative may adopt an adult so long as the person to be adopted is at least fifteen years younger than the petitioner and the petitioner and the person to be adopted have known each other at least a year. Thoughts like that happened. Thoughts that alarmed him. "We were all worried," he told her. "There's a trench in the waiting room where Morgan wouldn't sit down and your brother has drank enough coffee to stay up for the next two years. Garcia is even on her way here, I think."

Tessa smiled. "I love them. I love you. You guys know that, right?"

He just smiled again and kissed her forehead in much the same way Derek had and left the room.

* * *

Derek came back first, knocking lightly on the frame of the open door and she looked over with a smile. He came into the room and sat beside her. "How'd it go?"

"Thanks for letting us have a minute. Charlie wouldn't have understood the subtle asking for him to leave. Derek?" He flicked his eyebrows up in a way to have her continue. "You've been telling me for the past seventy two hours that you and I needed to talk."

He took a deep breath and sat back in his chair. "Yeah. We do." There was a pregnant pause. "I was wondering if when we got home you'd like to go on a date with me."

That wasn't how he had planned to say it. He'd planned a bit of a speech wherein he asked if she had feelings for him beyond friendship and where he told her of his feelings. He'd tell her that he would understand if she didn't, that it wouldn't change anything. He hadn't planned on just coming out and asking for a date.

"That depends," she said. His pulse both froze and raced at the same time.

"On what?"

Tessa smiled mischievously. "Is it just a date that will end in the same way all of your dates do? Or is it a serious date that you hope may turn into something more?"

The second one. But, what if that wasn't the right answer? "Something more. I'm aiming for there to be a lot of dates and for you to meet my mother."

He'd never introduced a girl to his mother before, despite the playful pushing to meet one. Tessa swallowed nervously at the thought of Derek meeting Diana Reid. "Okay," she whispered. "I would love to go on a date with you."

* * *

Spencer came back with a large strawberry smoothie an hour after having left the hospital. It was ridiculous how busy the twenty four hour shop had been at nearly dawn with a rash of people who had the case of the munchies after a long night of smoking the recently legalized marijuana. Spencer supposed he had no issue with those who wanted to use enough to get rid of a headache or some such, that was perfectly fine and safe. Anything in moderation. It was the people he stood behind in line who reeked of it, the smell always automatically giving him a migraine.

When he entered Tessa's room, she was asleep. Her face was soft and calm, her head tilted to the side, and Spencer sighed quietly- looking down at the smoothie that was already separating. Morgan was sitting in the chair Spencer had previously occupied, watching the micro expressions on her face as she dreamt. The man looked up as Spencer entered the room and went to stand, but Spencer stopped him with the shaking of his head. He set her smoothie on the side board to the hospital bed and sat down on the other side of the bed.

"How is she?" Spencer asked.

"She's doing fine. The doctors came in and gave her some more pain medication, told her she needed to get some sleep and that she'd be able to leave by Monday. Talked to Hotch and we're all going to stay until she's discharged. Garcia's plane just landed. Gideon went to get her."

Spencer nodded his head absently. He was glad that they'd be there. He knew logically it was unlikely he'd be able to be there in the room with her every minute for the next week, but he wanted to be sure she wouldn't be alone in the room. Ever. She hated hospitals and Spencer hated seeing her in one.

"Good," he said. Then, "Wait, did you say P-Garcia is coming?"

He had heard she was, but it hadn't really registered. He was ridiculously comforted to know she'd be there, but he didn't have a crush. Crushes were for children. He simply admired her. That was all. _Greatly_ admired her.

Derek smirked. "Yeah. She wanted to be here for you." He was very careful to say she wanted to be there for Reid specifically. He and Tessa had been thinking of ways to push them together. The four had gone to dinner and the movies more times than he could count, they'd gotten together for marathons at Tessa's house and then Tessa and Derek would 'go to the store' and leave them alone in the house for an hour or two, but nothing seemed to make a difference. Tessa had suggested they just shove the two in a supply closet together, but Derek doubted that would change things anymore than their other attempts.

Spencer smiled a bit and stared unseeingly at a spot on the wall, feeling himself starting to drift off as well.

 _"_ _Scars have the strange power to remind us that our past is real." -Cormac McCarthy_

 **A/N: So, hello. What did you think? Derek asking her on a date? Gideon thoughts? Spencer having feelings for Garcia? Help me come up with ideas for getting those two together. Do you think she did the right thing with Mason? What's your viewpoint? Love always, Skye.**


	10. Notes

**A/N: Okay, I said I was going to do this. I wasn't going to be the author that updated not a real update, but just an author note. Except, I just read the comments and I had to. I will, however, take this down with my next chapter.**

 **First of all, the same reviewers have been writing comments on my things since the beginning- but they always seem to have the exact same opinion as each other aside from one or two. I'm not sure if you are all inspired by what the others said and agree, or you're all the same person. Either way, that's been on my mind.**

 **Let's tackle those issues, shall we? Mason is still a killer and will be going to prison for a long time, but I am entertaining the idea of putting him in a mental place rather than straight prison and I think between Spencer and Tessa, they can make that happen.**

 **Morgan IS adorable and their relationship will be even paced, as well as I can manage even paced, and just as continually adorable. I'm not sure how to handle Garcia and Spencer, because with his character I think he would deny it and refuse to discuss it if Tessa brought it up. Garcia less so, but still.**

 **Gideon. I was really disappointed with everyone's reaction to Gideon. At one point in the last chapter (eight) I wrote that Tessa suggests to him about bringing the team and Steven together into one family. Then, when they got back from lunch, Gideon went to his office to make a call. I thought I was being just vague enough, but that people would get it. Gideon went to his office to call Steven and mend things. He has been in the process of mending things since. Sorry that wasn't clear.**

 **Gideon WOULD discuss that with ALL parties, Steven most definitely before anyone else. Diana would still be their mother, biologically and legally, etc, Gideon would just be their father. I didn't mention any of this through his perspective at the time, because it was a passing thought that he had begun to semi obsess over. Nothing more, though it may turn into something he wants legitimately. Diana might react badly, but I don't know. I haven't gotten there yet. He hasn't thought about how Steven would feel yet, because he hasn't even decided how HE feels about that thought that niggled into his brain.**

 **Gideon hasn't been a terrible father, Audra. Rather, he and his son don't see eye to eye mostly because of his job. I never got along with my parents, but that didn't make them bad parents. *cricket silence as the author thinks back and thinks to herself she should probably retract that* Gideon loved what he was doing. As does Hotch. Does it make Hotch a bad parent for not spending more time with Jack because of his job? No. Or JJ?**

 **I have not decided if Gideon will leave. I most likely will stick to that aspect of canon, but I may handle it differently depending.**

 **On a lighter note before I end this note, how do you guys feel about a parody case where a serial killer kills CEOs or spokespeople for different cereal types? Lol, my roommate gave me this idea and I think I about died. Love always, Skye.**


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